All that was for nothing.
The millions of dollars spent on both sides, all the energy and emotion, all the words that got typed about the April 21 special election on redistricting — none of it mattered. The Virginia Supreme Court ruled 4-3 Friday that the election is voided because it was unconstitutionally placed on the ballot. Virginia will now go forward with the congressional districts we’ve had since late 2021.
Attorney General Jay Jones blasted the decision as political. It’s certainly hard to disentangle the politics from this, but before we go debating the ruling we should remember that this was not a legal case about the election results, but whether the election was lawfully put on the ballot. Opinions obviously varied, and still do, but we need to be careful to distinguish between the legal questions (about the way the legislature advanced the measure) and the political ones (was this a good map or a bad map?).
For an account of what the court ruled and why, and what people are saying about it, I refer you to this story by Cardinal’s Elizabeth Beyer, our Richmond-based political reporter. In this column, I’ll look at the winners and losers beyond the plaintiffs and defendants.
1. President Donald Trump and Republicans nationally get a boost, at least temporarily
Let’s start with the obvious. The New York Times has been tracking the redistricting battles across the country — set off by Trump’s push for Texas to produce more Republican seats. Until recently, the impact had been pretty marginal. The Times estimated that, after Virginia’s vote that would have netted up to four Democratic seats, and Florida’s redistricting that would add four Republican seats, the national bottom line was somewhere between +1 Democratic seat to +6 Republican seats. Given how many seats usually change hands in a midterm election, even a gain of six Republican seats may not really matter. According to the American Presidency Project, the typical midterm swings are in double digits.
Now the math changes in a big way toward Republicans. We have to subtract Virginia from the list, so the count now moves to +3 to +10 for Republicans. Meanwhile, the recent ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court on the Voting Rights Act could result in up to 19 Democratic seats going away. Those two things don’t insulate Republicans entirely from the prospect of losing the U.S. House this fall — in the 2018 midterms of Trump’s first term, Republicans lost 40 seats — but they do change the calculus in a meaningful way.
2. Democrats may have lost the legal battle but could still win the political one
There is one important contrarian point to make, though: Trump’s approval ratings remain abysmal and run the risk of pulling down House Republicans in districts that might normally be safe. G. Elliot Morris, who runs the data site Strength in Numbers, estimated last month that Trump’s disapproval rate exceeded his approval rate in 134 Republican-held House districts nationally, including four in Virginia: the 1st (Rob Wittman), 2nd (Jen Kiggans), 5th (John McGuire) and 6th (Ben Cline). That raises the prospect that Democrats could knock off four Republican House members in Virginia even without redistricting. Now we’ll get a chance to find out. Those latter two districts remain a hard hill for Democrats to climb, but the overall political environment could put them within reach. Republicans can celebrate today but they shouldn’t think their work is over.
3. Perriello’s job just got harder
Had the “new” districts stayed in place, former Rep. Tom Perriello, D-Albemarle County, was in a good place. The only public poll had shown him with a commanding lead for the nomination — and he’d have gone on to a fall election in a Democratic-leaning district. Now he’s back to facing Rep. John McGuire, R-Goochland County, in a Republican-leaning district.
4. McGuire gets a reprieve but also a tough race
Of the four Republican incumbents that Democrats had targeted, McGuire was in one of the biggest binds. His home in Goochland County had been moved into the Democratic “lobster district” that would have started in Arlington. His odds of winning that would have been about as close to zero as can be. Now he gets to run in his current, comfortable district again. However, he shouldn’t discount Perriello as a competitor. Perriello has run, and won, in Southside before. (He’s also run and lost.) Democrats had also declared this district a targeted district — so McGuire should expect an energetic, well-funded opponent.
5. Macy is the biggest Democratic winner
The map that just got tossed paired her with Perriello — and essentially would have doomed her to an early exit. Now she gets almost a free shot at the Democratic nomination (Ken Mitchell of Rockingham County, the party’s nominee two years ago, remains in the race). On the other hand, the current 6th is the state’s second strong Republican district, so any Democrat is always going to be an underdog here. Next to McGuire, Cline is probably the Republican most relieved by the court ruling.
6. The 1stDistrict race will be a marquee race
Democrats have considered Rob Wittman in the 1st District as potentially vulnerable, so the court ruling moves him from being an underdog in a gerrymandered district to being threatened in his current district. Henrico County Commonwealth’s Attorney Shannon Taylor will likely be the Democratic nominee — she does have opposition, but is by far the best-funded contender, so that Taylor vs. Wittman campaign will be one of the biggest in the state. The only race that might top it is in the 2nd District, which we’ll get to next.
7. Kiggans’ situation doesn’t really change
The 2nd District in Hampton Roads has long been a swing district. The redistricting map that just got scrapped would have made it marginally more Democratic, but even under the current map, Kiggans faces a hard reelection campaign, most likely against former Democratic Rep. Elaine Luria. If Kiggans wins narrowly, there will be a lot of attention placed on the precinct swaps that would have taken place.
8. Lobster district, we hardly knew ye
Lots of Democrats were lining up to run in the reconfigured 7th District, the one shaped like a lobster. Now they have no place to go, unless they’re inclined to challenge fellow Democrats for nominations. The list of candidates was a “who’s who” of Northern Virginia Democrats: former first lady Dorothy McAuliffe; state legislators Elizabeth Guzman, Dan Helmer, Adele McClure, Saddam Salim; the list goes on. Their congressional ambitions will have to wait for another day.
9. Spanberger took a hit in the disapproval ratings for nothing
Spanberger is one of the biggest losers here, regardless of the court ruling. She presented herself in last year’s campaign as being inclined toward bipartisanship, but right away got thrust into signing the most partisan of bills — the enabling legislation for the referendum. In the first polls several months in, her disapproval ratings spiked while her approval rating stayed about the same. While there might be other reasons for those disapproval ratings rising (the governor was also doing other things), redistricting is surely a big one. Spanberger was likely truthful when she said last summer she had no plans for redistricting; the problem is the Democratic legislature did, and that left her with no real political options but to go along. In the 1980s, after former Labor Secretary Ray Donovan was acquitted of fraud and larceny charges, he famously asked: “Which office do I go to to get my reputation back?” Spanberger may be in much the same situation from a political point of view. The question now becomes whether she’ll be able to shake the fact that she supported this plan.
Of note: The Washington Post-Schar School poll earlier this year put Spanberger’s approval rating at 47% (the lowest of any new governor since such polling began in the 1990s) but that wasn’t much different from the 51% favorable rating that particular poll had her at just before the election. What had changed was on the other side of the ledger, where her 36% unfavorable rating before the election jumped to 46% disapproval. (The Post’s polling pre-election was also in line with polling from Christopher Newport University and Roanoke College.)
There hasn’t been much polling since then but the Public Sentiment Institute recently had a poll that showed Spanberger with a 52% approval rating and a 40.7% disapproval rating. It’s risky to read too much into any one poll (either this one or the Post one, for that matter), but that disapproval rating is distinctly lower than what the Post had and is more in line with what the Post was showing before the election. It’s possible the Post poll was an anomaly; it’s possible the Public Sentiment poll is. We need more polling to get the complete picture. However, to the extent that redistricting pulled Spanberger down, she’s likely better off without it.
10. Some Supreme Court justices just put themselves at risk
Virginia is one of just two states where Supreme Court justices are elected by the legislature — and unlike U.S. Supreme Court justices, who serve for life, the Virginia justices have 12-year terms. That means some of them will be coming up for reelection before the legislature whose work they just voided. The first two justices who will be coming up for reelection are among the most conservative — Arthur Kelsey, who authored the majority opinion, faces reelection in January 2027 from the very same legislators who passed the redistricting amendment the court just ruled unconstitutional. After that, in 2028, is Stephen McCullough, who joined in the majority opinion. Will they seek reelection? Will Democratic legislators be so bold as to deny them reelection? We haven’t seen the legislature deny reelection to a justice that the legislature put on the bench since 1895 (the court has failed to elect justices named on a temporary basis by a governor). This particular case may not be over, but the political ramifications may reverberate in Virginia for years to come.
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