The Virginia Supreme Court ruled to strike down a voter-approved redrawing of the state’s congressional boundaries on Friday. Its ruling looked into how the referendum was planned, not strictly the merit of the plan.
University of Virginia School of Law professor Michael Gilbert said the commonwealth’s highest court made its decision with the understanding that the Virginia General Assembly “did not follow required procedures” about amendments that are laid out in its constitution.
“That, in a nutshell, is the court’s decision,” Gilbert told 蜜桃视频app.
Gilbert explained that to make a change to the Virginia Constitution, votes by the General Assembly need to happen before and after a general election 鈥� what’s referred to as an “intervening election.”
He said the court could have taken a different tack, “because the procedures required by the state constitution are not very clear.” The 4-3 vote included what Gilbert called some “pretty powerful arguments” made by the dissenting judges.
“And although the majority of the court’s answer to that question seems, to me, to be a plausible one, it’s not the only one,” Gilbert said.
He said it’s unclear, yet contestable, that the General Assembly approved the vote before the general election or during it.
“Because if it was during it, then that doesn’t meet the constitutional requirements,” Gilbert said. “And you see that in the court’s opinion, it’s a 4-3 vote with a dissent coming out the opposite way on this question.”
Gilbert said there are two ways to look at the case: First, that the legislature is required to follow the law, regardless of citizens’ votes. And secondly, that “the whole case turns on a contestable question: What exactly does it mean to have an intervening election?”
“The political significance is that Democrats in Virginia will not be able to redraw their district lines now, which means they will not have the advantage in the November midterm election that they were expecting,” Gilbert said.
Virginia Democrats had hoped to win as many as four additional U.S. House seats under the redrawn map, as part of an attempt to offset Republican redistricting done elsewhere at the urging of President Donald Trump.
Gilbert said the decision is getting national attention, because it has distinctly national implications.
“We’re not talking about redrawing the district lines for members of Virginia’s legislature. We’re talking about redrawing Virginia’s congressional district lines. And of course, the members of Congress from Virginia participate in lawmaking that affects the whole country,” Gilbert said.
The majority of the Virginia Supreme Court’s ruling was critical of the state鈥檚 redrawing of the congressional maps to benefit one political party. Those justices noted 47% of the state鈥檚 voters supported GOP congressional candidates in 2024, but the new map could result in Democrats making up 91% of the state鈥檚 House delegation.
Don Scott, the Democratic speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, said Democrats respect the court鈥檚 opinion but lamented that it overturned the will of the voters: 鈥淭hey voted YES because they wanted to fight back against the Trump power grab.鈥�
While Gilbert said he thinks this decision marks the end of the road for the 2026 election, Virginia Democrats have asked the Virginia Supreme Court for a stay as they file an emergency petition to the Supreme Court of the United States.
“Today鈥檚 action is an imperative step in the process we promised to pursue to explore every available option to restore the will of the voters. We will continue moving through that process deliberately, responsibly, and with full respect for the voters who made their voices heard,” Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones said in a statement through a spokesperson.
There’s also a chance Democrats “could maybe redraw them in time for the November 2028 election.”
蜜桃视频app’s Ciara Wells and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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