Virginia Democrats look to decimate GOP seats in redistricting effort

Virginia Democrats are launching their last big campaign in the redistricting wars this week — but big questions loom about whether they can agree on how to maximize benefits to their party and whether they can convince voters to support their power grab.

On Wednesday, the Virginia Legislature kicks off its first session since Democrats won unified control of the commonwealth in last November’s elections. A persistent divide has emerged however, between Democrats who hope to draw an aggressive gerrymander that could deliver them 10 of the state’s 11 congressional seats — a four-seat grab for their side that would wipe out all but one GOP congressional district — and those who want to take a more subtle approach to offsetting GOP gerrymanders elsewhere.

“It will be a real debate. I mean, we want to get as much as we can, but we also want the referendum to pass,” Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.) told POLITICO Tuesday afternoon, adding that an expected Supreme Court decision this year on the Voting Rights Act could ultimately give Republicans more seats.

“[Democrats] basically have voting rights act seats in South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana,” he said. “They could all be gone, right? So that's a great concern. So it's essential in Virginia that we look at the fairness argument from a national perspective, not just the Commonwealth.”

Virginia’s current congressional delegation has six Democrats and five Republicans, so under the new maps Democrats would likely pick up three or four seats.

Democrats are worried that some of their members won’t be as eager to take on so much in such a truncated period of time. The party will need to be unified if they stand any chance of selling voters on the urgency of empowering legislators to draw new Congressional lines within a matter of weeks.

“I haven’t heard a lot of people talking about how much work it’s going to be to pass it,” said one Virginia Democrat granted anonymity to discuss internal party discussions. The person added that some in the party are underestimating the amount of time and political capital it will take to prop up a statewide campaign for what is expected to be a special election in April.

The National Democratic Redistricting Commission, the party’s group leading the charge on redistricting, confirmed to POLITICO it has presented two new maps to Virginia lawmakers. One remakes the map into a 9-2 configuration that only provides cover for districts held by Republican Reps. Ben Cline and Morgan Griffith from being eliminated. Another proposed map largely leaves intact Griffiths’ seat and, if approved, could deliver a 10-1 map, a development first reported by Punchbowl News.

John Bisognano, the NDRC president, argues that aggressive changes to the current Virginia congressional maps are necessary to respond to brazen gerrymanders Republicans drew in other states under pressure from President Donald Trump.

“Not for one second has Donald Trump laid down arms in this redistricting manufactured war that he created,” he said, adding that Democrats have so far fought him nearly to a draw after states like Indiana rebuffed Trump’s pressure campaign to take up recasting the state’s congressional lines.

Emboldened by their better-than-expected wins in statewide elections last year, Virginia’s legislative leaders say they want to eliminate as many GOP seats as possible.

“I said in August of 2025 that the maps will be 10-1 and I’m sticking with that today,” Virginia state Senate President Pro Tem L. Louise Lucas recently posted on social media. “Anyone in the congressional delegation who wants a seat needs to campaign for it and not expect a safe seat.”

Virginia’s Democratic House Speaker Don Scott also previously said he’s open to a 10-1 map that favors his party. Scott and Lucas did not respond to requests for comment.

State Sen. Ryan McDougle, the top Republican in Virginia’s upper chamber, criticized Democrats’ redistricting push just five years after voters passed a constitutional amendment that gave the authority to draw legislative and congressional lines to a bipartisan commission of state lawmakers and citizens. And he argued it would mark the permanent end of independent redistricting in the state.

“If this goes through, I find it hard to believe that we will not return to a path of gerrymandering in the future, because if [Democrats] can do it … I'm sure somebody will come up with a situation in the future that is just as egregious and do it back.”

McDougle is a plaintiff in a lawsuit seeking to block Democrats from what it says is “an unconstitutional redistricting amendment.”

“It's an illegal and unconstitutionally passed measure,” said Michael Young, a Virginia-based Republican consultant working to block Democrats’ redistricting push in the state. Previous conservative-led legal challenges to the current redistricting battles in Virginia have so far been unsuccessful.

Virginia’s redistricting effort comes days after Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis called for a special legislative session in April focused on mid-cycle redistricting that some predict could net Republicans between three to five seats. DeSantis said he wants to wait until April so he can get “guidance” from the Supreme Court since the justices are expected to rule later this year in a landmark voting rights case that could prohibit states from considering race when drawing new districts and give Republicans a freer hand to erase minority-majority districts. Some predict that, depending on the ruling, the high court’s decision could help Republicans gain upwards of 19 seats across several states.

“We know we have work to do, and I think we understand the assignment,” said state Sen. Lamont Bagby, who also serves as the chair of the Virginia Democratic Party.

Bagby said his party needs other Democratic-led states to join California, which passed a ballot initiative in November to help thwart Trump’s push to eliminate seats currently held by Democrats in red-leaning states. Already, Texas, North Carolina, and Missouri have changed their maps, though some GOP-led states like Indiana have bucked the president. Bagby said if Democrats stand any chance of taking back the House, they need to fight using new rules of engagement that Republicans are utilizing.

“They've already done enough to force us to put this to voters,” Bagby said. “I don't think anything's changed.”

An unanswered question is how big of a role the incoming Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger, who will be sworn in on Saturday, will play in the redistricting fight. She bested her GOP gubernatorial challenger Winsome Earle-Sears by 15 points and Republicans lost at least 13 seats in the House of Delegates. A week before those elections, Democrats approved the first step of a multi-step process to amend the state’s constitution to redraw congressional lines before the next Census in 2030.

In an appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” on Monday she expressed a desire to make good on campaign promises of making life more affordable for Virginians, but made no mention of redistricting. During a POLITICO forum in Richmond last month, she stopped short of embracing a redistricting overhaul that other governors have championed, including Gavin Newsom of California.

After the Legislature gavels in on Wednesday, lawmakers are expected to pass another amendment that will pave the way for Spanberger to call a special election in the spring. That election will allow voters to decide whether to give state lawmakers authority to amend the state constitution and approve new congressional maps.

“In light of what Texas, Missouri and now, Florida seem to be doing, it seems like we have a right to be in a position where we can take action if … Virginia voters allow us to do so,” Virginia Senate Majority Leader Scott Surovell, a Democrat, said in an interview.

Surovall said he does not foresee any major hurdles to a new map passage, though he anticipates there will need to be some reworking of the elections calendar to accommodate new candidate filing deadlines for federal House races once new maps are approved. The current deadline for House candidates is April 2, according to the Virginia Department of Elections.