Last month, Democrat Abigail Spanberger was sworn in as the 75th governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia. With Democrats now in control of the General Assembly and the governor’s mansion, Virginia has become the parade ground for the Left’s most radical, destructive, and aggressive ambitions: constitutional amendments for abortion, landmark gun-grabbing legislation, and an outrageous gerrymandering scheme that would make Illinois blush.

Spanberger also wants to reshape Virginia’s institutions of higher education. Two more odious bills have slinked their way before the House and into committee: HB1374 and HB1377. The former dissolves the Virginia Military Institute’s Board of Visitors and transfers its governance to Virginia State University. The latter, and more pernicious, creates the VMI Advisory Task Force “to determine whether [VMI] should continue to be a state-sponsored institution of higher education.”

The Left’s assault on VMI is nothing new. Cries of racism, sexism, and Confederate sympathies brought reporters to the small campus in Lexington, Virginia, during the woke wave of 2020, where they conjured stories to fit the cultural narrative. The upheaval resulted in the renaming of VMI buildings and the removal of Stonewall Jackson’s statue that had dominated the campus for decades.

The Left also ousted Superintendent General J. H. Binford Peay III, who had served in that position for 17 years after his august military service, during which he received the Silver Star and the Purple Heart. In 2020, then-Governor Ralph Northam attempted to pacify the woke mob that sought him on charges of donning blackface by informing Peay that he lost confidence in Peay’s leadership. The general resigned mid-school year.

I was a leader of the Corps of Cadets at VMI in 2020 when General Peay stepped down. The day after Governor Northam voiced his loss of confidence in Peay, the general called two other cadet leaders and me into his office. He was dressed in a suit and tie, the first time I had seen him in anything other than a uniform. General Peay explained to us his intent to resign, and that the Corps would need strong leaders to hold it together amid the furor. The general said something I will never forget: “Gentlemen, at the end of the day, it always comes down to honor. All you have is your honor.” To remain in the position as superintendent, even simply to close out the school year, after such a condemnation from the governor would have been an affront to his sacred honor. As VMI men, we understood.

Now, Governor Spanberger seeks another opportunity to dishonor VMI’s name. The ideological goal behind the recent spate of bills in the legislature is summed up in the fourth paragraph of HB1377, which directs the Task Force to determine if VMI has made any substantial moves to reduce racism and dismantle the “lost cause narrative” of the South. It also directs the Task Force to determine whether VMI has “the capacity to end the celebration of the Confederacy.”

The Democrats clearly want to humiliate, dismantle, and shutter VMI, the final steps in the tidal wave of cultural destruction that was unleashed in 2020. It doesn’t matter that Virginia removed more Confederate memorials and affiliations than the next seven states combined.

The Left’s Offensive Strike

The first volley in the Left’s assault on VMI began with the 1996 Supreme Court case United States v. Virginia. The Clinton Administration had sued VMI, the last all-male public university in the country at the time, to admit women. Justice Scalia, the lone dissenter to the Court’s mandated integration of VMI (Justice Thomas recused himself), noted that the system of governance installed by our country’s forefathers “is destroyed if the smug assurances of each age are removed from the democratic process and written into the Constitution.” At the end of his withering opinion, he remarked, “Today’s decision does not leave VMI without honor; no court opinion can do that. In an odd sort of way, it is precisely VMI’s attachment to such old-fashioned concepts as manly ‘honor’ that has made it, and the system it represents, the target of those who today succeed in abolishing public single-sex education.”

To supplement the Court’s draconian ruling, Bill Clinton’s Department of Defense warned VMI that if it went private to avoid the consequences of U.S. v. Virginia, all ROTC programs would be revoked from the school, preventing cadets from commissioning upon their graduation. The Institute capitulated.

In 2001, the next wave of the Left’s assault focused on the Institute’s religious observances, deep traditions that defined VMI since its inception in 1839. The entire Corps traditionally prayed grace together before supper every evening. The ACLU sued and won, and another jewel was taken from VMI’s crown.

After the ousting of General Peay in 2020, the Institute suffered more torment on the rack of DEI. The state commissioned a third-party group, which published a detailed report on VMI for the state, prescribing three remedies for the school’s “troubles”: recognizing the persistence of racial and gender disparities, understanding how VMI’s culture prevents those problems from being addressed, and implementing a bevy of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion proposals.

The implementation of the DEI regime at VMI was overseen by the Institute’s first black superintendent, Major General Wins, whose contract was not renewed after just four years, a rarity given that VMI has had only 16 superintendents in its 187 years. In a statement following the non-renewal of his contract in March 2025, Wins called the move a “partisan choice that abandons the values of honor, integrity, and excellence upon which VMI was built.” He maintained that “bias, emotion and ideology, rather than sound emotion, swayed the board.”

The last volleys against the Institute will be to strip it of its autonomy and self-determination, reprimand it for failing to follow every DEI prescription, and revoke its state funding. The Spanberger trifecta aims to cast down one of the last and greatest monuments to Virginia’s martial history in the name of equity.

Privatizing VMI

The looming defunding of VMI presents an opportunity that right-wing investors will rarely come across. There may soon be available a military academy with several hundred acres of property in the Shenandoah Mountains, featuring a Corps of mostly conservative, white males who aspire to become military officers, a cadre of veterans devoted to their training, and a martial tradition that stirs the heart of any young man. And this home comes pre-furnished.

The Right has spent much time in recent years discussing the need to build parallel institutions because the levers of institutional power lie outside of our grasp. Well, here is one existing institution, pre-built and with all the levers and culture intact. The privatization of VMI would be an epochal victory for the Right, serving both to conserve the greatest traditions of our nation and to shape a future of right-wing cultural dominance.

Private investors with an interest in buying VMI would gain access and influence over three highly coveted areas: strategic location, human capital, and the authority of tradition.

Defense titans with a patriotic ethos like Palmer Lucky could make an investment in VMI to secure a pipeline of disciplined, trained officers and foster research partnerships in cybersecurity and defense engineering. Anduril—and America—needs meticulous engineers and strong, capable leaders who thrive under pressure rather than wither away in DEI seminars. Privatizing VMI would provide a direct supply of combat-oriented, anti-woke cadets while preserving one of America’s last true warrior cultures.

Private military contractors like Erik Prince could gain access to a historic, independent training ground for elite officers and contractors free from bureaucratic and ideological interference.

Investors like Peter Thiel who have expressed an interest in rooting out DEI in education and corporations could turn VMI into the premier anti-woke military college that trains young men in honor, discipline, and leadership instead of guilt and identity politics.

VMI is waiting to be seized by investors with a desire to send a powerful message to the Left: the institutions that you have sought to destroy have only become more powerful.

Privatization by the Numbers

The first obstacle to privatization is, of course, monetary. The cost of the land and physical campus of VMI will likely range from $400 to 600 million, based on a comparative valuation of the neighboring Washington and Lee University campus in 2022.

Once purchased, the state-funded portion of the operating budget will need to be replaced. According to the VMI 2025-26 Operating Budget and Virginia’s 2025 state budget, this would amount to $34 million yearly, including general funds, unique military activities, and financial assistance.

If those funds were procured, the next obstacle to privatization is political. A legal battle would likely commence with Democrats over the sale or transfer of a state-owned entity to private hands. VMI-specific statutes will need to be repealed or amended, the Board of Visitors will need to be dissolved or restructured, and reaccrediting as a private institution will take more money and legal action. The cost of these legal moves will be on top of the already steep price tag for the campus, land, and operating costs.

Increasing tuition could help make up some of the difference. VMI currently charges about $20,000 for in-state tuition and $50,000 for out-of-state. Norwich and The Citadel, both private or semi-private Senior Military Colleges, charge $45,000-65,000.

VMI’s Last Stand

As I came to the end of my time at VMI, I was present for the removal of Stonewall Jackson’s statue and the numerous articles in the Floyd-incensed media calling me and my Brother Rats racists, sexists, and regressive Confederate sympathizers. Through that trial, I gained an education in manly honor and military skill, and became competent in the art of leadership. In short, the belligerent press in Richmond did not stop VMI from executing its mission, one that remains in line with America’s oldest martial traditions.

VMI cadets learn by heart the words of Colonel J. T. L. Preston, one of its founders, who described his vision for the Institute this way:

The healthful and pleasant abode of a crowd of honorable youths, pressing up the hill of science with noble emulation, a gratifying spectacle, an honor to our country and our State, objects of honest pride to their instructors, and fair specimens of citizen-soldiers, attached to their native State, proud of her fame, and ready in every time of deepest peril to vindicate her honor or defend her rights.

Colonel Preston’s vision has been the ethos of VMI for 187 years. For that vision to be upended by a tyrannical governor and legislature bent on imposing DEI would be a black spot in the annals of our national history. But the Left’s blitz against VMI has unwittingly created the very opening the Right has been seeking for decades. In attempting to shackle and defund this last bastion of honor and masculine virtue, Spanberger and her minions have exposed the fragility of state control and handed conservatives a fortress—if only they would seize it.