Virginia voters will decide on Tuesday whether to adopt new congressional maps that could help Democrats win control of the House of Representatives and scuttle Donald Trump’s effort to use mid-decade redistricting to preserve Republican control of Congress.
Polls show the referendum to redraw the maps has only a narrow lead in a state that Kamala Harris won two years ago. The issue appears to have engaged many voters, with nearly more than 1.37m ballots cast in early voting.
The special election is a key test for Abigail Spanberger, the Democratic governor who won a resounding election victory last November and supports the new maps, which could turn a delegation currently composed of six Democrats and five Republicans into one where Democrats hold all but one seat.
Spanberger has said the change is necessary to counter Trump’s effort to have red states use gerrymandering to preserve the GOP’s majority in the House ahead of the November midterm elections, in which the party in power historically loses seats.
“The president said he’s ‘entitled’ to more seats in Congress. Virginia voters have the power to push back,” Spanberger wrote on social media last weekend.
The tit-for-tat redistricting battle began last year after Texas’s Republican-controlled legislature redrew that state’s congressional maps in a bid to oust as many as five Democratic House lawmakers from their seats. Missouri and North Carolina also approved new district boundaries that could cost Democrats one seat in each state.
California voters retaliated by passing new maps that could flip five Republican-held seats, and the election in Virginia is now the second time that a Democratic gerrymander will be decided at the ballot box.
The commonwealth’s referendum would change the constitution to set aside, through the 2030 census, a nonpartisan redistricting process voters authorized six years ago. The legislature approved the change earlier this year, but would have to vote on it again if it wins the support of voters.
It is also the subject of an ongoing challenge before the state supreme court, which could still issue a ruling disqualifying its results. On Friday, the Republican national committee sued heavily Democratic Fairfax county, alleging that its voter identification procedures could allow non-citizens to vote. Two of the plaintiffs are Republican congressmen whose districts would change if the referendum passes.
Polls showed a close race in the weeks leading up to Tuesday’s vote, with signs that right-leaning voters in Virginia’s rural areas were incensed by new maps that would see many of them represented by lawmakers who live in the state’s northern suburbs outside Washington DC.
The surveys also showed that voters were divided on Spanberger’s performance as governor, with Republicans accusing her of lying about her moderate credentials on the campaign trail then quickly pivoting left as governor, including by supporting the referendum.
The race saw heavy spending by Democratic-linked groups and others, who poured more than $64m into the main committee backing the referendum. Groups opposing redistricting brought in around $30m.
Barack Obama recorded television ads in favor of the yes vote, while those opposed aired their own ads focused on past comments he had made criticizing gerrymandering. Glenn Youngkin, the Republican who preceded Spanberger as governor, campaigned heavily for the no vote.
The referendum’s success may embolden Florida’s Republican-controlled state assembly, which Ron DeSantis, the governor, has called into a special session beginning next month to consider changes to its congressional map. The GOP could pick up as many as three more seats depending on how the legislature draws the boundaries.
In addition to Virginia, Democrats are also expected to pick up a seat in Utah thanks to a court ruling that required the state to draw new boundaries.
