When early voting on the proposed redistricting amendment began, the General Assembly was still in session, so one pretty March day Del. Joe McNamara walked outside the State Capitol and recorded a short video to post on social media in which he urged a “no” vote.
“This amendment will not only take power away from the local people,” the Roanoke County Republican said. “It will consolidate power in Northern Virginia.”
McNamara was being mild.
Del. Wren Williams, a fellow Republican from Patrick County, posted a social media message about what he called “Fairfaxphobia,” which he described as “A distrust or fear that political power concentrated in Fairfax County is dominating decisions for the entire Commonwealth and imposing policies on communities that they cannot afford.”
That, too, was mild compared with the video being circulated by the Freedom Caucus Fund, an offshoot of the conservative caucus in the U.S. House of Representatives. “Fairfax is a Sanctuary County with Virginia’s most insane Trans, Sex Ed and DEI policies,” the video says. “And if you don’t vote, they’ll control FIVE Virginia Congress Seats. Stop them.” The audio plays over images of protesters holding signs that say “Love Trans Kids” and, just for good measure, the proposed redistricting map is displayed in rainbow colors.
Then there are the signs now appearing up and down the Shenandoah Valley that proclaim: “Don’t Fairfax Me.” The most prominent one is on a barn beside Interstate 81 just south of Harrisonburg where 29,000 or more drivers see it every day.
The name of Virginia’s most populous county is now being invoked as a verb in rural Virginia to argue against the proposed redistricting amendment.
We’re accustomed to candidates badmouthing one another or parties doing the same. Here’s a case where one of the main arguments employed by the “no” side, at least in certain rural parts of the state, is to run against a different part of the state. Even parts of Southwest Virginia where the redistricting map would leave voters in a Republican district, eight billboards have appeared urging: “Vote No” to a “Northern Virginia Power Grab.” They’re paid for by “Friends of Dr. Todd Pillion,” the Republican state senator who represents the region.
It’s hard enough to explain to the casual voter the multiyear process by which constitutional amendments are passed in Virginia, and perhaps even harder to explain redistricting even in more normal times. But invoking the specter of consolidating “power in Northern Virginia” might be a pretty powerful trigger for some conservative rural voters who are predisposed to see Northern Virginia as the reason why there’s a Democratic majority in the legislature passing bills they don’t like.
By that measure, “Don’t Fairfax Me” might be the clearest, punchiest campaign slogan that Virginia has seen since Jim Gilmore was swept into the governor’s office in 1997 on a platform of “No Car Tax!” We’ll see April 21 how effective it is.
The factual basis for “Don’t Fairfax Me” and the general campaign against Fairfax County and Northern Virginia as the villain in this political drama is political math. Northern Virginia is the state’s largest metro area; it’s also reliably Democratic. Right now Northern Virginia has three of the state’s 11 congressional districts, while a fourth contains part of Northern Virginia. For Democrats to maximize their power under redistricting (and conversely minimize Republican power), they needed to stretch those Northern Virginia districts into the Republican strongholds of the Shenandoah Valley and the Piedmont — to essentially “bury” those Republicans into districts dominated by Northern Virginia.
That’s why the proposed map has such elongated districts snaking out of Northern Virginia.
From three districts wholly based in Northern Virginia and a fourth partially in Northern Virginia, we would now have five districts partially in Northern Virginia. Both Fairfax and Prince William County would be split among five different districts. In four of those (the 1st, 8th, 10th and 11th), Fairfax County would be the biggest locality, although those vote shares range from 24.4% in the 1st to 49.94% in the 11th. In the fifth, the proposed 8th District, Fairfax would be the third-biggest locality, at 12.9%, with Alexandria and Prince William County being the top two.
At present, there’s just one member of the U.S. House from Fairfax County: James Walkinshaw in the 11th. The other Northern Virginia members are from Prince William County (Eugene Vindman in the 7th), Alexandria (Don Beyer in the 8th) and Loudoun County (Suhas Subramanyam in the 10th). In practice, that likely wouldn’t change much in the short term, given the power of incumbency. In theory, though, we could wind up with five House members from the same county, albeit one with a population north of 1 million. Or, conversely, we could wind up with none.
In any case, Fairfax is now a verb, and a pejorative one in the context in which it’s being used. How do people in Fairfax feel about some of their fellow Virginians using their locality’s name in such a way? I didn’t have time to interview all 1.1 million residents of Fairfax County, but I did make contact with two people who have been entrusted with the power to speak for some of them.
One of those is Jeff McKay, the chairman of the county board of supervisors and, yes, a Democrat. Here’s what he sent me:
“As your reporting has noted, Fairfax County and Northern Virginia play a significant role in funding the rest of the state, from roads and schools to law enforcement. We are a major economic engine for the commonwealth, and it is unclear why that would be seen as a negative, especially for those statewide beneficiaries. Politics can unfortunately rely on pitting one part of the state against another, an old trick that does a disservice to Virginians. This is a distraction meant to make voters think this is about an in-state rivalry and to divert attention from the harmful policies of the Trump Administration. I understand why some would want to distract from that record. This is not about one part of the state versus another. It is about whether Virginians believe the Trump Administration needs to be checked and whether its policies have damaged Virginia’s economy, from sky-high gas prices and tariffs, to impacts on federal workers and contractors, to threats to the rule of law. Virginia families have been hit hard, and that issue is far more important than pitting parts of the state against each other. The stakes are simply too high at this moment in our country’s history for that to decide this vote.”
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You can feel however you wish to feel about redistricting, but McKay is undeniably correct on one point: The most rural (and therefore the most Republican) parts of Virginia are financially dependent on Fairfax County and, more broadly, all of Northern Virginia.
The go-to example: school funding. Rural schools (and also some non-rural schools) get most of their funding from the state (in some places, north of 60%). Where does the state get that money? The single biggest source of tax revenue is Northern Virginia; it accounts for about 42% of the state’s general fund tax revenue. According to the state Department of Taxation, Fairfax County residents account for 22.9% of the income taxes paid in Virginia. In second place, Loudoun County, with 8.1%. If money talked (and sometimes it does), Fairfax County would have the loudest say in how Virginia spends that money.
Of course, that’s not exactly what those putting up “Don’t Fairfax Me” are talking about, but it is a useful reminder of how the state’s economy works. Rural Virginia wants Fairfax’s money, just not its politics.
On the other side of the spectrum is Fairfax’s lone Republican supervisor, Pat Herrity, who briefly sought the GOP nomination for lieutenant governor last year until he was sidelined by heart-related health issues. During a phone call, he told me he’s now recovered (thanks to two new aortas) and is back to playing hockey in a local adult league, which is not something most heart patients do.
After we dispensed with those pleasantries, we got down to business. Fairfax as a verb? “It’s the life I live every day,” he told me. “If I were in rural Virginia, I wouldn’t want a bunch of Fairfax or Northern Virginia Democrats controlling my congressional representation or being my congressional representative. I think it’s bad from a tax standpoint, bad from a regulatory standpoint, bad from a public safety standpoint, bad from an affordability standpoint — a lot of bads.” He then proceeded to list lots of policy disagreements he had with the Democrats on the Fairfax board.
Likewise, the chair of the Fairfax County Republicans had no problem with anyone who wants to run against Fairfax County to defeat the redistricting amendment. “Totally fair,” Katie Gorka said. “I feel people have every right to be upset. I don’t have bad feelings about it. I know people love to hate us.”
We’ll find out April 21 just how much.
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