The state Supreme Court is currently reviewing the plan's legality, a case that could potentially render the referendum results null. The question before voters was whether to temporarily set aside Virginia’s congressional maps intended to advantage neither party and replace them with a new version that could allow Democrats to win all but one seat in the 11-member delegation. The question seems to have divided voters in the commonwealth, just five months after they overwhelmingly elected a Democratic governor, Abigail Spanberger, and gave her allies a sizable majority in the legislature’s lower house. Polls have shown a narrow lead for the side in favor of redistricting, with a survey conducted by George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy and Government with the Washington Post earlier this month finding 52% of voters back the new maps and 47% are opposed. A similarly small lead for the yes vote has been reported in polls from State Navigate and Quantus Insights.
The Virginia redistricting referendum marks a setback for President Donald Trump, who initiated a national redistricting push last year. Trump urged Republican officials in Texas to redraw districts to help Republicans gain more seats in the November elections and retain a slim House majority, and the Texas gambit led to a burst of redistricting nationwide. Republicans believe they can win up to nine more House seats in newly redrawn districts in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio. Trump successfully encouraged Republican-controlled governments in Texas, North Carolina and Missouri to redraw their maps in a way that imperiled up to seven Democratic-held House seats.
Democrats think they can win up to five more seats in California and one more seat in Utah under new court-imposed districts. Democrats hope to offset the rest of that gap in Virginia, where they decisively flipped 13 seats in the state House and won back the governor’s office last year. California voters responded by approving a new map that could oust up to five Republican lawmakers in the state, while Republicans could pick up two seats in Ohio.
The new redistricting plan includes five seats anchored in the Democratic stronghold of northern Virginia, including one stretching out like a lobster to consume Republican-leaning rural areas. Revisions to four other districts across Richmond, southern Virginia and Hampton Roads dilute the voting power of conservative blocs in those areas. A reshaped district in parts of western Virginia lumps together three Democratic-leaning college towns to offset other Republican voters. The new plan could help Democrats win as many as 10 seats.
Democrats have portrayed the referendum as a necessary but temporary response to the GOP’s nationwide redistricting push. Democrats portrayed the Virginia redistricting as a response to Trump.
The back-and-forth battle is continuing in Florida, where the Republican-led Legislature is to convene April 28 for a special session that could result in more favorable congressional districts for Republicans. In Virginia, Democrats currently hold six of the 11 U.S. House seats under districts that were imposed by the state Supreme Court in 2021 after a bipartisan commission failed to agree on a map based on the latest census data.