On September 7, 2025, eleven grassroots organizations across Virginia partnered together to host an empty-chair town hall on the rule of law at Mason district government center in Annandale, Virginia. Organizers repeatedly invited Jason Miyares, the Attorney General for the Commonwealth of Virginia, emailing his office seven times and calling four. Despite the repeated attempts, Miyares didn’t attend. In fact, he never even confirmed receipt of the invitation, organizers shared.
The group didn’t let his silence stop them, though. They set up an empty chair, representing their absent official, and posed questions to the furniture.
The questions ranged across topics from immigration, to DOGE, healthcare, and more. 19 states sued over DOGE’s unprecedented power, which they used to fire federal employees en masse. Despite the fact that the national capital region—including Virginia—is home to roughly 20% of the federal workforce, Miyares did not join the lawsuit. The first speaker keyed in on that fact. “You did nothing when probationary employees, our best and brightest, were fired illegally.” She told the empty chair. “My son was among them.”
The empty chair did not respond.
Some speakers sharpened their questions like daggers. “Why aren’t you here?” Mike, of Fairfax, asked the chair. “I’ve been at this since the 60’s,” he said, referencing the fight for democracy. He had been tear-gassed three times at protests as a high schooler during the Nixon era. “We don’t want to go back to that. We’re going forward with democracy.”
Another speaker, Maryann, a 90-year-old former nurse who had worked in pediatrics, lambasted the Health and Human Services Secretary, RFK Jr., a long-time vaccine skeptic. He removed career public health officials and replaced them with those aligned to his views, prompting them to review vaccine mandates and recommendations. Trump’s Big Bad Bill also risked the closure of several rural Virginia hospitals, putting the community in danger. How would Virginia’s Attorney General respond to changing recommendations?
She had personal reasons to be concerned. The former nurse shared that when she was young, her cousin died of Measles. Back then, there was no vaccine for the disease, which she said they didn’t even understand at the time.
Maryann also reflected on her husband, a former Metro Police Department officer and public servant. He was humble and respectful, the way public servants should be, she thought, comparing him to the current administration officials. “If he was not already deceased, this would kill him.”
Questions came in from as far as Roanoke, who submitted a question in advance. Miyares found that Roanoke College had violated Title IX and discriminated against female athletes when it allowed a transgender woman to swim on the women’s team. The Roanoke community pointed out that Miyares’ own report explicitly stated that there was not sufficient evidence that any women were denied the opportunity to compete.
It similarly stated that the transgender swimmer never competed, couldn’t win awards or set records, and resigned after only four days. “Given that your own findings contradict the narrative of victimized female athletes,” they asked, “why did you choose to hold a press conference and launch this investigation just weeks before the election? How do you justify using taxpayer resources and your official position to investigate a case where, by your own admission, no competition opportunities were denied, and no hostile environment created?”
“They look forward to your response,” the Master of Ceremonies, who read the question on behalf of the Roanoke constituents, sarcastically told the empty seat.
ICE was another hot topic for the questioners. Trump built his campaign on the promise of deporting violent criminals, but, as one speaker reflected, ICE was targeting “20 or 30 year members of our communities.” Virginia’s National Guard announced last month that it would assist ICE with logistics and administrative support. Although the Guard maintains that it will not help make arrests or enforce laws, it’s little comfort for the northern Virginia communities who watched the National Guard occupy Washington D.C. just across the river.
Although Miyares did not attend, the groups were still treated to a VIP speaker. VA State Delegate Holly Seibold, who represents Fairfax county, joined the event. Seibold was a public school educator and non-profit worker before becoming a politician. She created BRAWS, a non-profit that provides undergarments and feminine hygiene products to members of the community in need.
Seibold provided brief remarks at the end of the event, empathizing with the attendees. She shared the story of one of her constituents who had just been deported. She had fled from El Salvador and came to the U.S. legally under a protective order. She had two young sons, one on the Autism spectrum.
Officials told Seibold that the woman volunteered to ‘self-deport,’ but Seibold kept digging and found that she had been given an ultimatum: sign the paper agreeing to voluntarily deport, or be separated from her sons. Any parent would know that was no choice at all.
Seibold tried to intervene, but it was too late. The woman had to wear an ankle monitor as part of the agreement, and she feared that if she skipped the flight to El Salvador, ICE would raid her house. Before she was deported, she had worked at a local restaurant and had been working to master the English language. Her sons were both attending public school. They were valuable community members, Seibold reflected. Now, they’re back in an extremely dangerous situation.
As the event wound down, the Master of Ceremonies summed up the silence that followed each question. “Bueller? Bueller? Miyares?”
“We are disappointed. Grassroots groups from northern Virginia, to Richmond, to Roanoke came together to invite and engage with our top lawyer and elected leader and he is a no show.” Said Stair of Network NOVA, one of the event sponsors, speaking on Miyares’ absence. “We tried everything the last three weeks, calling, emailing, offering to meet by zoom or talk to a representative of Miyares’ choice. We never got a response to any of our invitations, but decided to hold the town hall anyway to underscore the importance of rule of law at this time in our history.”
In the end, Miyares struck himself speechless in a literal sense.
