Alison Virginia O'Connell (Alexandria City Council At-large, Virginia, candidate 2026)
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Alison Virginia O'Connell (independent) is running in a special election for an at-large seat of the Alexandria City Council in Virginia. O'Connell is on the ballot in the special general election on April 21, 2026.[source]
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Biography
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Elections
General election
The general election will occur on April 21, 2026.
Special general election for Alexandria City Council At-large
Sandy O. Marks (D), Frank H. Fannon (Independent), and Alison Virginia O'Connell (Independent) are running in the special general election for Alexandria City Council At-large on April 21, 2026.
Candidate | ||
Sandy O. Marks (D)  | ||
| Frank H. Fannon (Independent) | ||
| Alison Virginia O'Connell (Independent) | ||
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Endorsements
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Campaign themes
Ballotpedia survey responses
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Campaign website
O'Connell's campaign website stated the following:
Trump-proofing Alexandria
The Trump Administration is risking the lives and livelihoods of ordinary Alexandrians. Trump's ICE agents have torn families apart and kidnapped people who speak out for justice. His reckless tariffs have made prices unbearable for tens of thousands of Alexandria workers and their families. He is overseeing the largest wealth transfer from workers to billionaires in US history. And he's cutting vital social services that Alexandrians need.
Alison O'Connell will be our ally in Alexandria fighting Trump’s attempts to rob and punish the working class. Alison will work to protect the legal rights, personal data, and physical safety of all Alexandrians, in a world where all three are under increasing threat. Alison will be a forceful defender of all of those targeted by Trump and rising fascism: workers, LGBTQIA+ Virginians, immigrants, religious, racial, and ethnic minorities, the disabled community, and those who criticize U.S. foreign policy (including about Israel). She will also support legislation that safeguards our air, water, and infrastructure.
Affordable Housing
Everyone in Alexandria deserves a safe and livable home. But housing costs have spiraled out of control. Alexandria’s working class can’t afford to live here. Hard working renters and their families need protection from bad landlords and eviction.
Alison supports strong legislation to hold landlords responsible for the conditions of their buildings. She calls for a city hotline and web portal to allow tenants to schedule and track inspections. If a landlord refuses to make repairs, Alexandria should do it and send them the bill.
Alison supports the creation of extensive new affordable housing in Alexandria. She'll back that through a suite of approaches that empower Alexandrians to live dignified lives. She supports inclusionary zoning and backs improved tax incentives and subsidies for affordable-only housing developments. Alexandria also has the authority to scale up affordable construction itself; Alison will fight for new social housing. New apartment development should not be approved without deeply affordable units included, period. Alexandrians need housing available at 30 and 40% AMI (Area Median Income), and they need it now.
Virginia's Dillon Rule unfortunately prevents Alexandria City from enacting rent freezes, rent control, "just cause" eviction rules, and the right of first refusal for mobile home owners. But Alison O'Connell will fight for a multi-faceted eviction prevention strategy. Tenants deserve legal support and financial assistance, including reviving the COVID-era eviction protection fund and supporting Northern Virginia Legal Services in their courthouse eviction prevention work. Alison also supports using Alexandria's Housing Authority to ensure everyone in our city has a safe and high quality home.
Ethical Investment
Israel's ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people has claimed thousands of lives.
Over 12 million Alexandria taxpayer dollars have gone to fund Israel — money that could have been spent on healthcare, education, and good jobs. And Virginia-based weapons manufacturers have been profiting off of mass slaughter.
Alexandria invests in human rights abuses taking place in Palestine, Sudan, Congo and the U.S.A. through city-and-state-level investments. Between Alexandria's Supplemental Retirement Plan, OPEB Trust composite plan, Defined Benefit Plan, and Alexandria’s cash reserves in the Virginia Treasury’s Local Government Investment Pool (LGIP), our city is invested in companies such as Amazon, Lockheed Martin, General Electric, Cisco, Microsoft, Toyota, Caterpillar, and more. These companies are active participants in a slew of human rights violations, including genocide, apartheid, occupation. They are destroying our environment, accelerating the climate catastrophe, exploiting workers and driving wages down across all industries. Many of them help the Trump administration surveil, abduct, and cage vulnerable community members within our borders.
In 1985, Alexandria’s City Council divested city funds from apartheid South Africa. Alison wants Alexandria to continue their legacy. Alexandria is a community that fundamentally values human rights for all people, and Alexandria city residents and public employees do not want their tax dollars and pensions to support cruelty and violence. She supports a human rights screening process for all city funds.
Abolish ICE
Alison O'Connell supports the abolition of ICE. Period.
Sheriff Casey is facilitating the detention and deportation of our neighbors by transferring people to ICE. Alison will lead the effort in City Council to wield all political pressure available, including supporting the community demand to decrease the Alexandria Sheriff budget until Casey ends all voluntary collaboration with ICE.
Alison opposes Virginia state agencies collecting and sharing data for immigration enforcement. She will work for Alexandria to ban sharing automatic license plate readers data with ICE. She is committed to blocking local police from acting on ICE's behalf or inquiring about immigration status during routine stops, and she strongly opposes the use of the National Guard on behalf of ICE. Alison believes all Alexandria jails should stop honoring ICE requests.
Alison knows Alexandria doesn't exist in a vacuum. She will use her platform as an elected official to pressure Virginia legislators to ban the construction of any private prison in Alexandria.
Alison supports the demand from community members to close Farmville Detention Center and Caroline Detention Center. She will leverage her position on the City Council to support detainees until these barbaric, unsafe facilities are closed and their occupants are returned to their families.
Beyond stopping ICE, Alison will work to use city power to stabilize immigrant communities through humane policies on housing, education, and healthcare.
Sex and Gender Justice
Our queer and trans neighbors in Alexandria and across the United States are facing intense oppression and violence. Former Governor Youngkin and Trump have set us back significantly. Our city must be a safe haven for LGBTQIA+ people. Alison O'Connell will advocate for strong enforcement of anti-discrimination laws in employment, housing, and in our schools, to protect LGBTQIA+ Alexandrians. She will engage actively with the city’s LGBTQ+ Task force and support priorities they identify in the community.
The cost of living crisis in Northern Virginia hits the LGBTQIA+ community particularly hard. Alison will protect LGBTQIA+ city members by working to expand and protect gender-affirming care citywide, including access to hormones.
Alison is a strong proponent of reproductive justice for both cisgender and transgender Alexandrians. People have an inalienable right to make decisions about their own bodies, including abortions and gender-affirming medical procedures. Alison will support all efforts to increase access to safe abortions for anyone who seeks one.
Alison will advocate at the state level for a constitutional amendment to enshrine the right to abortion and bodily autonomy in Virginia's constitution. She will also use her position of authority to advocate at the Virginia level for Medicaid and all private insurance in the state to cover gender-affirming care and abortions, with no exceptions.
Alison supports decriminalizing sex work (for both independent contractors and businesses) and applying a harm reduction framework to drug possession and consumption. Criminalization of sex work and drug consumption disproportionally impacts people of color and LGBTQIA+ people, especially people who are in the intersections of both identities. Decriminalization of sex work also reduces exploitation and trafficking, while increasing public health and safety.
Supporting Children and Teachers
Our schools need more funds. Alexandria’s 2027 proposed budget for our schools includes a 1.5% increase in funding, significantly less than ACPS’s requested budget increase of 3.5%. We need to eliminate that gap.
One of the largest expenses in our city’s budget is for the police and Sheriff’s departments. Police make our community members, especially people of color and disabled people, less safe. Policing makes all Alexandrians less safe. A well-funded school system, with adequate mental health and academic resources for all students, will bring us much closer to a goal of community safety than carceral investments in police and prisons ever will. We should cut back our police budget and use that money to invest in our city’s children.
Alison will fight to end the school-to-prison pipeline, end harmful seclusion and restraint practices, and ensure that students with disabilities receive the accommodations they need to thrive in the classroom.
Alison supports the long-term, community-led effort to remove SRO’s (school resource officers) from our public schools and reapportion those funds to mental health supports for students.
— Alison Virginia O'Connell's campaign website (March 16, 2026)
See also
2026 Elections
External links
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Candidate Alexandria City Council At-large |
Footnotes
