The Virginia Supreme Court won’t stop a Special Election on April 21 that could enact a new congressional map. The election could decide if a map likely to net Democrats four more U.S. House seats goes into effect this election cycle.
While arguments will still proceed on a lawsuit challenging the mid-decade redistricting effort, the court declined to cancel an April 21 vote. In that election, voters will decide whether to authorize the Democrat-controlled Virginia General Assembly to craft new cartography.
Virginia voters in 2020 approved a constitutional amendment giving redistricting responsibilities to a nonpartisan commission, made up of half Assembly members and half citizens. Republicans had called for the state Supreme Court to quash any election that could undermine the restriction this year.
“The denial of the motions to stay has no effect on the referendum scheduled for April 21, 2026, and nothing in this order shall prevent the parties from raising the underlying arguments and issues as this matter goes forward,” The Supreme Court decision reads.
Democrats in the Assembly already approved an aggressive map with 10 Democrat-leaning seats and only one Republican district. Virginia’s current congressional delegation has six Democrats and five Republicans.
According to the Virginia Public Access Project, the proposed map has one district, Virginia’s 9th Congressional District, where Republican Winsome Earle-Sears won a majority of the vote in the Governor’s race in November. In every other proposed district Gov. Abigail Spanberger won at least 54.5% of the vote.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has already announced it is targeting districts represented by Republican U.S. Reps. Rob Wittman, Jen Kiggans and John McGuire, who respectively represent Virginia’s 1st, 2nd and 5th Congressional Districts.
The new map would also endanger U.S. Rep. Ben Cline in Virginia’s 6th Congressional District.
Meanwhile, the National Republican Congressional Committee had listed freshman U.S. Rep. Eugene Vindman, the Democrat who represents Virginia’s 7th Congressional District, among its targets.
But under the new map, every incumbent could find themselves running in November to represent a largely different constituency than in place right now.
