The debate over AI has reached new highs and new lows.

Below, I report on what Gov. Abigail Spanberger said in a new, lengthy interview she gave to a content creator, along with some of what I heard at last week’s labor protest in Richmond.

And I share a new protest song that calls out Spanberger’s veto of the public sector collective bargaining legislation.

Want to get in touch, or have stories you want me to cover? Reply to this email or reach out to me directly at michaeloconnor@couriernewsroom.com.

Michael O’Connor

Reporter, Dogwood

Gov. Abigail Spanberger takes questions from reporters after a bill signing in Fairfax on May 13, 2026. (Michael O’Connor/Dogwood)

Spanberger spoke at length with content creator Tevin Davis about how she’s feeling about the public anger over her vetoes of high-profile bills related to collective bargaining, retail cannabis, and immigration enforcement.

It’s a long and seemingly candid interview where Spanberger does most of the talking. In watching it, I was struck that Spanberger was addressing directly the anger and sense of betrayal that many people who supported her are feeling.

“We just keep facing disappointment after disappointment, and I know that I have added to that,” Spanberger said in the interview. “And so I would say to people, I will continue to do what I believe is right, and I’m in the weeds and in the details. People can disagree, but I promise you that I am in this to try and make lives better.”

These comments come after that disappointment was on display last week in Richmond, where a large crowd of union supporters rallied in protest of her veto of the collective bargaining bill.

Kathryn Brown, president of the Waynesboro Education Association, told me she canvassed for Spanberger last year from April until Election Day, and that a big reason she supported Spanberger was because of her support for collective bargaining.

“We are really, really disappointed,” Brown said at the protest. “I would hope that she would rectify this eventually. We still really need a strong collective bargaining bill in Virginia.”

Read what Spanberger and her critics are saying

“The Trump administration is planning a government-wide nondisclosure agreement that would bar federal workers from sharing a wide array of ‘confidential government information,’” The Washington Post’s Scott Nover and Meryl Kornfield report.

Harold Meyerson at The American Prospect has an editorial criticizing Spanberger’s veto of the collective bargaining legislation.

Victoria A. Ifatusin at The Richmonder reports on the Richmond School Board voting 5-4 to outsource the hiring of some substitute teachers.

Assault style weapons and hand guns are displayed for sale at Capitol City Arms Supply on Jan. 16, 2013, in Springfield, Ill. (AP Photo/Seth Perlman, File)

Virginia is entering a new chapter in the gun debate.

Brandon Jarvis at Virginia Scope reports that some local commonwealth’s attorneys from conservative localities have said they won’t enforce the new ban on assault-style weapons that Spanberger recently signed into law.

Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones told Jarvis that, “Commonwealth’s Attorneys are elected to enforce our laws, which is what we expect them to do when these laws take effect on July 1.”

To which the Pulaski County commonwealth’s attorney responded via Avery Davis at 29News in Charlottesville: “Commonwealth’s Attorney are elected to pursue justice, not merely ‘enforce our laws.’”

In this Friday, Oct. 13, 2017, file photo, Garry Shrum, a music memorabilia specialist at Heritage Auctions, displays an acoustic guitar that belonged to Bob Dylan in Dallas. (AP Photo/LM Otero, File)

If you only follow the charts, you’d be forgiven for thinking that protest music is dead in this country.

But a new upload from the Richmond-based jam band Betsy From Mars is here to prove you wrong.

The new song laments Spanberger’s veto of the collective bargaining legislation and Richmond Mayor Danny Avula’s support for using Flock surveillance cameras in the city.