James Blair, the White House’s top midterm strategist, is refusing to accept Tuesday’s Virginia redistricting vote as a done deal. He says the legal battle is only getting started, and he expects the Virginia Supreme Court to throw the whole thing out.
Virginia voters narrowly approved a referendum on Tuesday to reshape the state’s congressional map in Democrats’ favor, according to CNN. The measure passed 51% to 49% with 97% of the vote counted. Under the new map, Democrats could win as many as 10 of Virginia‘s 11 congressional seats, up from the current six they hold.
Blair pushed back hard in a CNN interview on Wednesday morning. “This is illegal what they did under their own state law,” he said. “A lower court judge already said that. And the Supreme Court let the referendum go on, but they still have to rule on the merits. And if they do the right thing, they will rule that this was an illegal action for this cycle.”
Virginia Supreme Court could still kill the map
A Tazewell County circuit court judge had already ruled against the redistricting push before Tuesday’s vote. According to OPB, Circuit Court Judge Jack Hurley Jr. found that lawmakers broke their own procedural rules when adding the redistricting amendment to a special session. He found that the initial vote happened too late and that the state failed to publish the amendment three months before the election, as required. Virginia’s Supreme Court is now weighing the case, and its ruling could make Tuesday’s vote meaningless.
Blair also pointed to the narrow margin as a sign of Democratic weakness. “Last night, this was a 3-point race,” he said. He argued that if Republicans perform at a similar level in November, they could hold their House seats even under the redrawn lines.
How this redistricting war started
NBC News reported that Virginia House Speaker Don Scott declared the vote a turning point: “Virginia just changed the trajectory of the 2026 midterms.” Governor Abigail Spanberger, a Democrat who backed the referendum, said she was committed to returning to the state’s bipartisan redistricting process after the 2030 census.
The fight in Virginia is part of a broader national redistricting war that Donald Trump himself started. Trump pushed Texas Republicans to redraw congressional maps last year to shore up the GOP’s thin House majority ahead of the midterms. Democrats in California and Virginia then followed with their own redraws to counter. Republicans estimate they can net up to nine additional House seats from new maps in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio. Democrats are counting on California and Virginia to close that gap.
The overall redistricting war now looks something close to a draw, though Republicans could regain a slight edge if Florida moves ahead with its own redraw at a special session scheduled for April 28.
Republicans say they were outspent
Former Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin led the Republican campaign against the referendum and acknowledged the spending gap heading into election day. “They have outspent us three to one. They’ve raised over $70 million. And yet this is a close vote,” Youngkin told Fox News the night before the election.
Multiple GOP operatives said that Republicans failed to invest early enough in Virginia, where Democrats held a roughly 3-to-1 spending advantage throughout the campaign. That gap left Republicans outmatched on the airwaves and may have cost them a chance to stop a map that Democrats hope will deliver four new House seats.
The redistricting battle in Virginia is now being closely watched for what it signals ahead of November’s midterms. Democrats need just a few seat pickups to retake control of the House. You can read more about the 25th Amendment push Democrats have been making against Trump and the ex-Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax case that has separately rocked the state’s political world.
