Democrat Ralph Northam has defeated Republican Ed Gillespie in the Virginia governor race on Tuesday, according to an NBC News projection.

Both national parties have spent millions of dollars in Virginia and are closely watching it as an early barometer of the political climate and test of campaign tactics in the first major election since Donald Trump’s unexpected victory last year.

Northam, an Army veteran and pediatric neurologist who serves as the state’s lieutenant governor, struggled to capitalize on his ad-ready biography as the race descended into a nasty culture war. Popular Democrat Gov. Terry McAuliffe is term-limited.

Gillespie is a former lobbyist and Republican National Committee chairman who seemed surprisingly adept at navigating the troubled waters of the Trump-era GOP, with a message aimed at the president’s voters and a biography that has helped keep establishment Republicans onboard.

After nearly losing his primary election to a Trump-like far-right candidate, Gillespie pivoted from tax cuts to cultural issues as a centerpiece of his campaign, with an ad defending Confederate monuments and others attacking Northam for allegedly being soft on Latino gangs and pedophiles.

(AP)