Fox News published an article entitled, “Virginia AG Candidate Once Referenced Putting ‘Two Bullets to The Head’ of GOP Leader, Texts Show,” which was written by Charles Creitz on October 3. The shocking exposé described how the Virginia Democrat nominee for Attorney General, 36-year-old Jay Jones, advocated the assassination of then-Speaker of the House of Delegates (2022-24), Todd Gilbert (R-Luray), in texts with a Republican lawmaker in August 2022.
Jones, an ex-Norfolk delegate (2018-22), who clearly lacks basic common sense, or worse, failed to realize that anything written on social media can appear on the front page of the New York Times or any other website tomorrow morning. He is clearly the absolute epitome of a dumb a**.
And he wants to be the next attorney general of Virginia? You have to be kidding me.
For some unexplained reason, it took his murderous threats over three long years to be known publicly. I find that replete with consternation, but I am hesitant to speculate just this moment.
When news of Jones’s assassination threats appeared on the internet, he profusely and publicly apologized, groveling for forgiveness while trying to rationalize his text messages “as just asking questions” on October 3. I am certain that his belated apology was neither sincere nor truthful.
I call it political desperation and survival. The only sincerity about his apology was that he got caught, and his political career is most likely over for the rest of his life.
The commonwealth of Virginia’s Latin motto, “Sic Semper Tyrannis [thus always to tyrants],” which was angily shouted by Senator Marcus Brutus upon brutally knifing Julius Caesar to death on March 15, 44 B.C., was always meant for true tyrants and never for make-believe ones. Jones’ internet threats were borderline nuts at best, which are in need of a grand jury investigation, depending on the statute of limitations.
Jones angrily texted Delegate Carrie Coyner (R-Chester) on August 8, 2022, after the death of 90-year-old politically moderate Delegate Joe Johnson (D-Bristol), who died on August 4, 2022, and retired in 2014, that Johnson “leaked everything to your [Republican] caucus. It’s why [House Speaker] Gilbert gave him such a glowing tribute.’”
Jones continued, “‘if those guys die before me, I will go to their funerals to piss on their graves,’”…. Then I will “send them out a wash in something.” Whether Jones was talking about “cement shoes” in the James River, a one-way trip to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, or perhaps something far more nefarious is pure speculation.
However, the criminal mind can be extremely and creatively intelligent when necessary. After all, the highly privileged Jones graduated from William and Mary in 2010 and obtained his J.D. or law degree from the University of Virginia in 2015.
Unfortunately, Jones’ vitriol as expressed to Coyner gets more threatening, psychopathic, and more like Lee Harvey Oswald on November 22, 1963.
Jones texted Coyner in the most unequivocal terms. He stated, “‘Three people, two bullets. Gilbert, Hitler, and Pol Pot. Gilbert gets two bullets to the head.’” I truly doubt that Gilbert belongs in the same genocidal category as either Hitler or Pol Pot, who were both responsible for the killing of tens of millions of human beings.
Jones doubled down and called Gilbert and his wife “evil.” In one text, he stated, “‘I mean, do I think Todd and Jennifer are evil? And that they’re breeding little fascists? Yes [my emphasis].” Jones even “invoked the death of Gilbert’s children, [who were then two and five years old,] and said it might cause the then-Speaker to change his political views.” Advocating the killing of children or pedicide is really sick.
Jones would have made Mafia boss John Gotti of the Gambino crime family proud.
Why Coyner did not report Jones’ homicidal threats to the Virginia State Police or local law enforcement in 2022 is beyond my understanding. However, I suspect that she deliberately withheld this information just in time to disrupt the 2025 state election. That is what I truly call an October surprise.
Jones’ threatening remarks became even more despicable. He stated, “‘Spoiler: put Gilbert in the crew with the two worst people you know, and he receives both bullets every time [my emphasis].'”
Jones later tried to rationalize his homicidal hatred in a frantic telephone conversation to Coyner, but I think that he was more motivated by desperately trying to save his political career. One of his numerous pitiful excuses was “‘like all people, I’ve sent text messages that I regret, and I believe that violent rhetoric has no place in our politics.’”
“Regret”? Spare me your guilty conscience.
In my opinion, Jay Jones must be removed as the Democratic Virginia Attorney General nominee, prosecuted, and disbarred. This is also one more imperative reason why mail-in ballots and early in-person voting, which began on September 19, should be abolished, except for the truly physically handicapped, other disabled people, and those who can neither drive nor walk to the polls on Election Day, which this year is on November 4.
Otherwise, Virginia’s democracy dies in ignorance and ignominy. The thought of Jay Jones, who is now a pariah lawyer, becoming the next attorney general of the commonwealth would be a travesty of both justice and democracy.
Robert L. Maronic
