Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican who won last fall's gubernatorial election by creating plausible distance between himself and Donald Trump, has seen that distance shrink a bit more. A top deputy to the state's attorney general, Monique Miles — who represented Virginia in election-related legal matters — has been forced to resign after the Washington Post found social media posts in which she repeatedly praised the Capitol insurrection and embraced Donald Trump's false claims of election fraud.
Monique Miles, who until Thursday was deputy attorney general of government transactions and operations, apparently spread baseless claims about voter fraud and election interference over the course of several months on Facebook. Her office was unaware of this until Post reporters inquired, according to Victoria LaCivita, a spokeswoman for Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares.
"This information was unknown to the Office of the Attorney General prior to this morning," LaCivita told the Post. "Ms. Miles has resigned from her position at the Office of the Attorney General."
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While the Capitol attack of Jan. 6, 2021, underway, Miles reportedly wrote that it was the work of "patriots."
"News Flash: Patriots have stormed the Capitol. No surprise. The deep state has awoken the sleeping giant," Miles wrote on Facebook. "Patriots are not taking this lying down. We are awake, ready and will fight for our rights by any means necessary."
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That post was later revised after pushback from commenters, with Miles claiming that demonstrators were in fact "antifa dressed as Patriots," a claim made by many conservatives at the time that has been widely debunked.
RELATED: Half of Republicans think Jan. 6 siege was peaceful or staged by antifa, new poll finds
In earlier posts unearthed by the Post, Miles appeared to spread false or unproven claims about Chinese interference in the 2020 election, alleging that systematic voter fraud had marred the outcomes in battleground states like Arizona and Pennsylvania.
"The China interference is real," Miles wrote in one post. "That is high level national security stuff. They can't just release this evidence in civil court without following the proper protocol."
On more than one occasion, Miles declared that Trump was the legitimate winner of the 2020 election. "These left wing violent loonies better realize that [Donald Trump] is getting a second term," she wrote.
In an email exchange with the the Post, Miles said that it was "important for people to be able to have free and open dialogue on topics of concern without being cancelled."
Within the Youngkin administration Miles reportedly represented the Commonwealth of Virginia in election-related litigation and provided legal counseling to both the state to the state department and board of elections. Her division also handled election administration during the pandemic.
