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virginia
Virginia Democrats Ask US Supreme Court to Restore Voter-Approved Map
"The irreparable harm resulting from the Supreme Court of Virginia's decision is profound and immediate," top state Democrats said of the decision that struck down the new districts.
May 11, 2026
Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones and Democratic leaders in the state General Assembly on Monday asked the US Supreme Court to block a ruling against a ballot measure establishing new voter-approved congressional districts that favored Democrats.
The Virginia Supreme Court on Friday delivered a blow to the Democratic battle against President Donald Trump's gerrymandering campaign when it struck down a political map that Virginians had narrowly backed last month. The new districts could help Democrats secure up to four seats in the US House of Representatives in the November midterm elections.
Jones, Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates Don Scott (D-88), state Senate Majority Leader Scott Surovell (D-34), and Senate President Pro Tempore L. Louise Lucas (D-18) are seeking a stay, arguing that based on a "novel and manifestly atextual interpretation" of the Virginia Constitution, the state Supreme Court "overrode the will of the people who ratified the amendment by ordering the commonwealth to conduct its election with the congressional districts that the people rejected."
"A stay is warranted because the decision by the Supreme Court of Virginia is deeply mistaken on two critical issues of federal law with profound practical importance to the nation. The decision below violates federal law in two separate ways," the emergency application says. "First, it predicated its interpretation of the Virginia Constitution on a grave misreading of federal law, which expressly fixes a single day for the 'election' of representatives and delegates to Congress."
"Second, by rejecting the plain text of the Virginia Constitution's definition of the term 'election' to adopt its own contrary meaning, the Supreme Court of Virginia 'transgressed the ordinary bounds of judicial review such that it arrogated to itself the power vested in the state legislature to regulate federal elections,'" the application continues.
The filing also stresses that "the irreparable harm resulting from the Supreme Court of Virginia's decision is profound and immediate. By forcing the commonwealth to conduct its congressional elections using districts different from those adopted by the General Assembly pursuant to a constitutional amendment the people just ratified, the Supreme Court of Virginia has deprived voters, candidates, and the commonwealth of their right to the lawfully enacted congressional districts."
The Associated Press noted that "Democrats are taking a legal long shot in asking the justices to reverse the Virginia ruling. The Supreme Court tries to avoid second-guessing state courts’ interpretations of their own constitutions. In 2023, it turned down a request by North Carolina Republicans to overrule a state Supreme Court decision that blocked the GOP's congressional map."
The high court also has a right-wing supermajority that includes three Trump appointees—and which gutted the remnants of the Voting Rights Act in a ruling related to Louisiana's congressional districts late last month.
Under current conditions, Republicans are expected to pick up seats in Florida, Missouri, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas due to redistricting demanded by Trump, while Democrats are expected to win more districts in California, where voters also approved new political lines benefiting them.
The Washington Post reported Monday that "some top Democrats express little hope that the appeal will affect this November's congressional midterms and are pivoting to waging campaigns in the state's existing districts."
According to the newspaper:
Surovell (D-Fairfax) said "the practical realities of our election calendar" will prevent candidates from running in new maps even if conservative justices on the US Supreme Court were open to helping Virginia Democrats.
Tuesday is the deadline set by state elections officials for putting the ballot mechanisms in place. Surovell noted that Virginia’s elections software is antiquated and overdue for replacement.
Instead, Democrats are making the case that it’s time to work with the cards they have in hand.
"Since we can't control anything other than mobilizing and organizing, then let's mobilize and organize and turn our anger into fuel for that," Rep. Jennifer McClellan (D-Va.) said.
In a Monday letter to fellow congressional Democrats, US House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (NY) called out the "vicious Republican assault on the right to vote, free and fair elections, and Black political representation in the South," and pledged that "our effort to forcefully push back against the Republican redistricting scheme will not slow down."
Jeffries also announced a caucus-wide briefing planned for Thursday "to discuss the steps Democrats are taking to advance the largest voter protection effort in modern American history," and declared that "Democrats will take control of the House of Representatives in November."
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'Terrifying Moment in Our Democracy': Virginia Supreme Court Rejects Voter-Approved Redistricting
"Unlike GOP-led states that redrew their congressional maps in backroom deals, Virginia let the people decide," said Sen. Tim Kaine. "But the Virginia Supreme Court has blocked the people's choice."
May 08, 2026
Virginia, one of two states that combated President Donald Trump's gerrymandering campaign by enacting voter-approved congressional districts favoring Democrats, had its new map struck down by the state Supreme Court on Friday.
"On March 6, 2026, the General Assembly of Virginia submitted to Virginia voters a proposed constitutional amendment that authorizes partisan gerrymandering of congressional districts in the commonwealth," notes the court opinion. Voters narrowly approved the proposal, 51.7% to 48.3% last month.
However, the state's high court found that "the legislative process employed to advance this proposal violated Article XII, Section 1 of the Constitution of Virginia. This constitutional violation incurably taints the resulting referendum vote and nullifies its legal efficacy."
Responding in a Friday statement, Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates Don Scott (D-88) said that "we respect the decision of the Supreme Court," while also celebrating that so many Virginians turned to the ballot box to "fight back against the Trump power grab" and pledging to keep up the battle "for a democracy where voters—not politicians—have the final say."
Some leading Democrats were more critical of the Republican-majority state court, which Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones said "has chosen to put politics over the rule of law" with a decision that "silences the voices of the millions of Virginians who cast their ballots in every corner of the commonwealth, and... fuels the growing fears across our nation about the state of our democracy."
"Before the court, my office clearly laid out both in filings and oral arguments that this constitutional amendment process and voter ratification occurred in a timely, constitutionally compliant, and legally sound manner," he continued. The court "contorted the plain language of the constitution and code of Virginia to give it a meaning that was never intended, which allowed them to reach the wrong legal conclusion that fit their political agenda. The consequences of their error are grave."
"This court's ruling follows a dangerous trend of tilting power away from the people," Jones added. "My team is carefully reviewing this unprecedented order, and we are evaluating every legal pathway forward to defend the will of the people and protect the integrity of Virginia's elections."
Denouncing the decision as "outrageous and unconscionable," Congressman Eugene Vindman (D-Va.) said that "at the heart of our democracy is the principle that the results of elections ought to be respected, and the Virginia Supreme Court today dealt our democracy a terrible blow."
MoveOn Political Action's chief communications officer, Joel Payne, also called out the court for "silencing and invalidating the votes of 3 million Virginians," the majority of whom "voted to level the playing field against Republican efforts to avoid accountability at the ballot box."
"Once again, the courts have blunted the will of the people, and are giving a green light to President Trump and Republicans’ unprecedented power grab in the midterms," said Payne, whose group had endorsed Virginia's ballot measure.
US Tim Kaine (D-Va.) isn't up for reelection this cycle, but he still stressed the importance of convincing voters to support Democrats, no matter what their congressional maps look like, in the November midterms. As he put it: "Unlike GOP-led states that redrew their congressional maps in backroom deals, Virginia let the people decide. But the Virginia Supreme Court has blocked the people's choice. So we have to campaign and win on their maps. We can do it!"
California is the other state where voters approved a new map for the US House of Representatives in response to Trump pushing Republican leaders in Texas, Missouri, and Florida to redraw districts to help the GOP in the next election. As in Virginia, California's redistricting is being challenged in court. There have also been recent changes to political lines in Ohio and Utah that could help influence control of Congress.
The 4-3 ruling in Virginia—which election expert Dave Wasserman noted is an "enormous setback for Dems" who had hoped to pick up four seats—came just hours after Tennessee Republicans passed a new map targeting the state's only majority-Black district, despite objections in Memphis and across the state. Their move followed the US Supreme Court ruling that gutted the remnants of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) last week, which also led to an ongoing fight over a primary in Louisiana.
Human rights attorney and former Illinois congressional candidate Qasim Rashid said Friday: "So to be sure, US Supreme Court says red states can ignore the will of the people and gerrymander their districts 9-0 in favor of MAGA Republicans. But VA Supreme Court says blue states cannot put the vote to the will of the people and follow through on the people's vote to redistrict."
"Once again, gerrymandering that centers white people is A-OK, but gerrymandering that centers a broad base of voters is not," he added. "Absurd."
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Blame John Roberts for This Anti-Democratic Redistricting War
It's obvious to a majority of ordinary Americans that partisan gerrymandering undermines fundamental democratic principles. If only the Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court would have the courage to admit it.
Apr 25, 2026
In the short run, Democrats' victory in gerrymandering Virginia to create four new blue Congressional districts is a good thing. It will restore balance to the critical 2026 House elections to offset Republicans' Texas gerrymandering which created four new red districts.
President Donald Trump was technically right when the night before the Virginia vote he told a conference of supporters, “I don’t know if you know what gerrymandering is but it’s not good.” Of course what Trump really meant is that gerrymandering is bad when it disenfranchises Republicans but good when it disenfranchises Democrats.
Here's what we do know: partisan gerrymandering is an affront to democracy by letting politicians pick their voters instead of voters picking their politicians. Given Republicans' successful gerrymandering, the Virginia gerrymander was the least bad immediate option. As House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a sharp reversal of recent establishment Democrats' attitude, "When they go low, we strike back."
But looking forward, partisan gerrymandering should be illegal. As Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan wrote in her dissent to Chief Justice John Roberts' 2019 majority ruling that partisan gerrymandering is non-judiciable, “partisan gerrymanders here debased and dishonored our democracy, turning upside-down the core American idea that all governmental power derives from the people. If left unchecked, gerrymanders like the ones here may irreparably damage our system of government.”
You can blame John Roberts for debasing and dishonoring our democracy and irreparably damaging our system of government.
In his 5-4 majority decision in Rucho v. Common Cause in 2019, Roberts ruled that challenges to partisan gerrymandering are "political questions" that courts may not interfere with. Roberts may have disingenuously claimed in his confirmation hearings that he is nothing but an umpire calling balls and strikes, but in reality he changes the strike zone to favor Republicans.
Partisan gerrymandering blatantly violates the Equal Protection clause of the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. Partisan gerrymandering treats voters of the then minority party in a state unequally to voters of the then majority party and gives the then majority party an unequal advantage in securing their future electoral control regardless of the will of the voters. Voters from different parties do not have an equal chance to affect the outcome of elections. As Justice Kagan wrote in her dissent to Rucho a voter's constitutional equal protections rights“can be denied by a debasement or dilution of the weight of a citizen’s vote just as effectively as by wholly prohibiting the free exercise of the franchise.”
It's obvious to a majority of ordinary Americans that partisan gerrymandering undermines fundamental democratic principles. An August 2025 Reuters poll found that 55% of respondents, including 71% of Democrats and 46% of Republicans, thought that the partisan gerrymandering taking place in Texas and California are "bad for democracy." Regular Americans understand the dangers of partisan gerrymandering better than John Roberts in his lengthy "legal" opinion that courts can't do anything to prevent it.
Since Rucho was decided in 2019, advances in computer algorithms have enabled the majority party in a state to construct voting districts to virtually guarantee with surgical precision their own electoral victory.
If Roberts and his Republican cohorts on the Court were honest, they would consider revisiting and overturning Rucho and giving lower courts the power to devise standards for deciding if a partisan gerrymander is too much. But given the partisanship of the Republican Justices, that's unlikely to happen.
If, despite the disadvantages of partisan gerrymandering, Democrats regain control of Congress, they should enact legislation term limiting SCOTUS justices (after which they may keep their lifetime judicial tenure by taking senior status) and increasing the number of Justices from 9 to at least 12. This can be done by legislation and does not need to overcome the nearly impossible bar of a Constitutional Amendment. To protect democracy, Court reform should be a key part of Democrats' political platform.
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