Residents of Fairfax County will go to the polls to vote for their representatives in the Virginia House of Delegates November 2. As one of the biggest counties in the Commonwealth, Fairfax will vote for 17 different districts which are all currently represented by members of the Democratic party.
Below are the races in each district and who will face off against each other:
In District 34, Republican nominee Gary Pan will try to unseat the incumbent Democrat Kathleen Murphy. Pan has lived in Northern Virginia for more than 30 years and has a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Lehigh University among other degrees. Pan is president and CEO of Panacea Consulting Inc. and is director of Lucid Technologies, Inc. This will be Pan’s second run for the district seat having lost to Murphy in the 2019 general election.
Murphy has represented the district since she first won the seat in 2015 and has served on the House Finance, the General Laws, and the House Transportation committees. A graduate of American University, Murphy has worked as a senior advisor in the U.S. Department of Commerce and served as president of the consulting firm Johnson, Murphy, & Associates.
In District 35, Republican nominee Kevin McGrath will go against Democratic incumbent Mark Keam who has held the office since 2010. McGrath is a Fairfax native who worked for the CIA from 1978 to his retirement in 2015. McGrath was also a coach for youth soccer, basketball, and baseball teams in the Vienna area for 20 years. He graduated from Virginia Tech with a degree in Political Science.
His opponent, Keam, is a graduate of the University of California at Irvine as well as the University of Hastings, College of Law. Keam has served as vice-chair of the House Finance Committee and served the House Courts of Justice and Education committee. He has also worked as a senior advisor for strategic affairs at Verizon.
In District 36, Republican nominee Matt Lang will face off against Democratic incumbent Ken Plum who has held the office since 1982. Lang is a military veteran. He served in the U.S. Marines, Navy Reserve, and most recently the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS). Following his time in the military, he was a deputy sheriff in Fairfax and Loudoun counties. Lang has earned degrees from the Northern Virginia Community College, the American Public University System, and Denver University. He has worked as an international security consultant.
Plum graduated from Old Dominion University in 1965 and the University of Virginia in 1967. Plum was also an administrator for the Fairfax County Public Schools from 1967 to 1997. Plum currently serves as the chair of the Agriculture, Chesapeake, and Natural Resources Committee as well as serving on the Appropriations and Public Safety Committees.
In District 37, Republican candidate Kenny Meteiver will try to unseat the Democratic incumbent David Bulova who has held the office since 2006. Originally from Indiana, Meteiver enlisted in the U.S. Army as a combat engineer after the events of September 11. Meteiver left the Army in 2007 and soon moved to Centreville in 2014. He graduates from Indiana University with a degree in Business Administration.
Bulova is a graduate of the College of William and Mary and has worked as a senior planner for AMCE Earth and Environmental Inc. Bulova has also sat on the board for the Center for Watershed Protection and was a division director and planner for the Northern Virginia Regional Commission. Bulova currently serves as chair of the General Laws committee.
In District 38, Republican nominee Tom Pafford will face off against Democratic incumbent Kaye Kory who has held the district seat since 2010. As a US Air Force officer, Pafford was a political analyst focused on nuclear arms control. Following the Air Force, he ran his own IT business — clients included local, state, and federal agencies; universities; domestic and overseas companies. He graduated from the University of Maryland with a degree in Political Science. Pafford and his family have lived in Fairfax County for more than 25 years now. His wife, Sultana, emigrated from India. They have two boys who are now in college.
Kory has earned degrees from Miami University, George Mason University, and University of Iowa. Kory has worked as a program manager, program founder, and manager for the Great Books Program for Seniors for the Fairfax County Department of Community Action. Kory currently serves as the chair for the Counties, Cities, and Towns Committee and sits on the House Finance and Public Safety Committees.
In District 39, the race is being run between Democratic incumbent Vivian Watts and her opponent Republican nominee Maureen Brody. Brody is a graduate of the University of Maryland with a bachelor’s in International Relations and Economics. Brody has also been a copy editor and freelance writer and owns her own business Brody Editing Services which has been in operation since 2000.
Watts, who has held the district seat since 1996, graduated from the University of Michigan in 1962 and has worked as executive director of Fairfax Court Appointed Special Advocates and as a consultant for the U.S. Advisory Committee on Intergovernmental Relations. Watts currently chairs the House Courts of Justice Committee and is the co-chair of the House Finance Committee.
In District 40, Republican nominee Harold Pyon will go against Democratic incumbent Dan Helmer who won his seat after defeating Republican incumbent Tim Hugo in the 2019 general election. Pyon immigrated from Korea over five decades ago settling in Virginia and is a graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University where he went to school on the G.I. Bill after serving as a medic in the U.S. Army.
Pyon has held many roles in local and state government including serving on the Fairfax County Parks Authority, the Virginia State Board of Elections, the Fairfax County Small Business Commission, and the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Helmer is also a U.S. Army veteran who has served in Iraq, Afghanistan, and South Korea and works as a business strategist advising both U.S. government agencies and companies. He currently serves on the Public Safety and Transportation Committees in the General Assembly and is a Rhodes Scholar.
In District 41, Republican nominee John Wolfe will try to unseat Democratic incumbent Eileen Filler-Corn who has held office since 2010. This will be Wolfe’s second run at the district seat, he ran as an Independent in the 2019 general election where he lost to Filler-Corn. Wolfe graduated from Vanderbilt University and later earned his MBA from Wharton.
Filler-Corn was elected as House Speaker in January 2020, before that she served as House minority leader starting in 2018. Filler-Corn works as an attorney and earned her law degree from the Washington College of Law. Filler-Corn currently chairs the House Rules Committee in the general assembly.
In District 42, Republican candidate Ed McGovern will face off against Democratic incumbent Kathy Tran who assumed office in 2018. Originally from Philadelphia, McGovern is a retired federal employee having worked with the U.S. Army and various federal departments in resource management. He graduated from Shippensburg University with a degree in Political Science and later earned his master’s in Public and International Affairs from the University of Pittsburgh. McGovern has been involved in the Northern Virginia community since 1993.
Tran came to the United States as a refugee from Vietnam. She is a graduate of Duke University and the University of Michigan. Tran served as a Presidential Management Fellow as well as assistant director of skills and workforce development at the National Immigration Forum. Tran currently serves on the General Laws and the Health, Welfare, and Institutions committees in the general assembly.
In District 43, Republican nominee Brenton Hammond will face off against Democratic incumbent Mark Sickles who has held office since 2004. Hammond is originally from North Carolina where he earned a degree from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. Hammond has lived in the Northern Virginia area since 2008 and served for eight years as part of the U.S. Secret Service Uniformed Division and currently works as an analyst.
His opponent, Sickles, has served as chairman of the Minority Caucus since 2012 and serves as chair for the Health, Welfare, and Institutions committee. Sickles has worked as a government and public affairs consultant and in corporate affairs for Weeks Marine, Inc. Sickles has degrees from Clemson University and the Georgia Institute of Technology focusing in industrial management and technology and science policy.
In District 44, Republican candidate Richard Hayden will go against Democratic incumbent Paul Krizek who assumed office in 2016. Hayden has lived and worked in the Washington D.C. area as a law school student and lawyer since 1984. Hayden owns his own law practice which specializes in real estate and business law, he also serves as counsel for Kingstowne, a local settlement company.
His opponent, Krizek, is a graduate of the University of Virginia and the Columbus School of Law at Catholic University. Krizek has served as chief counsel and vice president in charge of fundraising for Christian Relief Services Charities Inc. He currently serves on the Appropriations, General Laws, and House Privileges and Elections committees.
In District 45, a new representative will be elected after Democratic incumbent Mark Levine lost his primary to his party’s new nominee Elizabeth Bennett-Parker. Levine had held the office since 2015. Bennett-Parker will face off against the Republican nominee J.D. Maddox.
Maddox was born at Fort Belvoir and has served in the U.S. Army for eight years and served as a branch chief in the CIA. Maddox has earned degrees from St. John’s College and Georgetown University and is an adjunct professor at George Mason University. Maddox also serves as CEO of the consultancy firm Inventive Insights.
Bennett-Parker is currently an at-large member of the Alexandria City Council and serves as vice-mayor. Bennett-Parker co-leads Together We Bake, a nonprofit job training and personal development program for under-served women and is the founder of Fruitcycle which tackles the issue of food insecurity. Bennett-Parker has earned degrees from Cornell University and the University of London.
In District 48, Republican nominee Edward Monroe will face off against Democrat R.C. Sullivan Jr. who has held the office since 2014. Monroe was a Fulbright Scholar. He is currently pursuing a master’s in Educational Leadership. A native of Pittsburgh, Monroe has worked as a teacher in the DMV area for more than 19 years as well as in the U.S. Peace Corps.
Sullivan has served as president of the Legal Services of Northern Virginia and on the Board of Governors for the Virginia Bar Association. He has earned degrees from Amherst College and the University of Virginia. Sullivan currently serves as the vice-chair of the Labor and Commerce Committee in the general assembly.
In District 49, Democratic incumbent Alfonso Lopez faces a three-way race going against Republican nominee Timothy Kilcullen and Independent candidate Terry Modglin.
Lopez assumed the office in 2012 and currently serves as minority whip in the General Assembly. Lopez also sits on the House Rules and the Public Safety committees. Lopez holds degrees from Vassar College and Tulane University where he studied environmental law.
Kilcullen is a native of Manhattan, N.Y., and has a degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and later settled in Crystal City. On his campaign website, Kilcullen is listed as an activist with one of his main concerns being the what he calls the preferential treatment of Amazon, Inc.
Modglin is no stranger to the district as he ran for the same seat as a member of the Green Party in 2013. Modglin has degrees from Georgetown and American universities and is a veteran of the U.S. Army. Modglin has worked as a national non-profit program manager, the CEO of a consulting firm, and as a retail worker.
In District 53, Republican candidate Sarah White will face off against Democratic incumbent Marcus Simon who has held the office since 2014. White lives in Falls Church and works in the service industry as chief operations officer for YHR Holdings and works with the The Cowboy Café and The Lost Dog Café in their locations in South Arlington, McLean, and Dunn Loring. In addition to being active in area Chambers of Commerce, she serves on the policy board for the National Association of Women Business Owners and is also on the board for Visit Fairfax.
Simon is the current chair of the House Privileges and Elections Committee and serves in the House Rules, General Laws, and the House Courts of Justice committees. Simon has a degree in Middle East studies and journalism from New York University. He has worked as a real estate attorney and for the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General Corps.
In District 67, Republican candidate Bob Frizzelle will face off against Democratic incumbent Karrie Delaney who assumed office in 2018. Frizzelle identifies himself as a moderate Republican, he was also a member the U.S. Air Force Signals Intelligence Corps and a vice-president of Northrup Grumman and Booz Allen Hamilton. He graduated from Duke University with a degree in Political Science.
Delaney has been a member and chairperson of the Fairfax County Citizen Corps Council and the Fairfax County Library Board of Trustees. She currently serves on the House Courts of Justice, the Health, Welfare, and Institutions, and the House Transportation committees. She is also a graduate of the University of South Florida.
District 86 will see a new representative as Ibraheem Samirah lost his race in the Democratic primary to challenger Irene Shin. Samirah had held the office since 2019. Shin will face off against Republican candidate Julie Perry.
Shin is a California native who is a Herndon resident and is the daughter of Korean immigrants and currently works as executive director of the Virginia Civic Engagement Table. Shin has been involved in public service in Virginia since 2014.
Perry, a native of North Dakota, has degrees from the University of Maryland and West Virginia University and works as a high school history teacher.