Elon Musk called Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger “utterly racist and sexist regarding White men” after she posted a photo praising her diverse cabinet on X.
On Thursday, Oct. 29, Spanberger shared a group photo of herself with seven members of her administration. In state government, the cabinet is the governor’s team of top appointed officials, the secretaries who oversee big areas like finance, education and transportation. “I’m proud to have the most talented, hardest-working cabinet in Virginia’s history. They are also the most diverse cabinet Virginia has ever seen,” she wrote.
She added that every secretary was “selected because they’re the best of the best in their respective fields” and that the group brings perspectives from Danville, Hampton Roads, Richmond, Northern Virginia and beyond.
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The photo showed Spanberger with mostly Black officials and one other white woman. No white men appeared in the shot.
Katie Miller, a conservative commentator and the wife of White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller, was among the first to call it out. “30% of Virginia residents are White men. Zero represented here,” she wrote. Census figures put white men at roughly 28 to 32 percent of Virginia’s population.
Musk followed with a reply aimed straight at the governor: “You are utterly racist and sexist regarding White men. Shame on you!”
The photo was not her full cabinet. A spokesperson for Spanberger told Newsweek the image came from a photo shoot for Style Weekly, a Richmond publication, and said “this is not a photo of her entire cabinet.”
Her official roster includes several white officials who were left out of the picture: Secretary of Finance Mark Sickles, Secretary of Transportation Nick Donohue, Secretary of Labor Jessica Looman, Secretary of Natural and Historic Resources David Bulova and Secretary of Veterans and Defense Affairs Timothy Williams. Four of those five are men.
Spanberger’s picks drew praise when she named them in January. Cardinal News reported that three of her appointees had served in the General Assembly, Virginia’s state legislature, while others had held senior roles in past administrations. Secretary of the Commonwealth Candi Mundon King is a former state delegate. Secretary of Health and Human Resources Marvin Figueroa previously served as a deputy secretary. Secretary of Education Jeffrey Smith spent 15 years as a school superintendent in Hampton. Some of her appointments also earned praise from Republicans.
This is not Musk’s first shot at Spanberger. During her 2025 run for governor, he accused her of dodging questions about bathroom policies for transgender students, writing that she “obviously does shamefully support boys in girl’s sports.”
Musk owns X, briefly ran the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency, known as DOGE, and has put more than $75 million into America PAC, the political group he helped start to back Donald Trump.
Spanberger, a former CIA officer, became Virginia’s first woman governor when she took office in January. The clash over her cabinet photo comes as the Trump administration works to dismantle diversity, equity and inclusion programs, better known as DEI, across the federal government.
