Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears speaks with a reporter at her office in Richmond, Va., on Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025. (AP Photo/Allen G. Breed)

Virginia Lt. Gov. and 2025 gubernatorial candidate Winsome Earle-Sears (R) received campaign donations from a known Nazi sympathizer in Ohio, despite criticizing a fellow politician for doing the same.

According to Virginia Public Access Project, Earle-Sears has received nine $100 monthly payments to her Political Action Committee Winsome PAC from Richard Iott between August 2024 and May 2025. Iott is a longtime resident of Ohio who ran for Congress against Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D) in the state’s 9th Congressional District in 2010.

During his congressional run, The Atlantic revealed that Iott was an active member of the Wiking group, which devoted itself to re-enacting battles conducted by the 5th Panzer Division of the Nazi German army during World War II. According to the Toledo Free Press, Iott participated in several Nazi re-enactments between 2002-08 while donning a Waffen-SS uniform. In a statement to the magazine at the time, Iott denied subscribing to the ideals of the Nazi Party and claimed to only have a historical interest in the German army.

Iott also downplayed how his past might affect Jewish voters.

“They have to take it in context. There’s reenactors out there who do everything. You couldn’t do Civil War re-enacting if somebody didn’t play the role of the Confederates. [This] is something that’s definitely way in the past.”

He continued: “[I hope voters] take it in context and see it for what it is, an interest in World War II history. And that’s strictly all.”

Historians told The Atlantic that the Wiking reenactors greatly sanitizes the real Waffen-SS and overlooks the group’s atrocities.

Earle-Sears, who won the Republican primary for Virginia’s 2025 gubernatorial election last month, previously criticized a fellow GOP candidate for taking money from a Nazi sympathizer while she was actively accepting money from Iott. During an appearance on “The John Fredericks Show” in March, Earle-Sears bashed former Republican Senate candidate Corey Stewart for his financial support from Paul Nehlen, a former congressional candidate from Wisconsin with ties to Nazi meme culture online.

“But then he went ahead and bought the list of an avowed Nazi,” Earle-Sears said. “Why would you do that. Why do you want money from him and why do you want money from his folks, his side?”

Video from “The John Fredericks Show” episode from March 17, 2025. (Source: John Fredericks Media Network on Rumble)

Earle-Sears did not respond to a request to comment on receiving money from Iott.

Earle-Sears has served as Virginia’s lieutenant governor since 2022 after serving two years in the Virginia House of Delegates from 2002-04. She also ran a pair of unsuccessful campaigns for the U.S. House and Senate in 2004 and 2018, respectively. Incumbent Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) is ineligible to seek a second term due to a one-term limit in the state.

Recent polling suggested Earle-Sears was trailing her Democratic opponent Abigail Spanberger by as much as 17 percentage points with the off-year election scheduled for Nov. 4.