Democrats Devastated After Supreme Court Rejects Attempt To Revive Virginia Congressional Map

Authored by Matthew Vadum via The Epoch Times,

The U.S. Supreme Court late on May 15 rejected an appeal by Virginia officials who sought to challenge the Virginia Supreme Court’s recent decision to block a congressional map approved by voters that favored Democrats.

The unsigned order in Scott v. McDougle provided no reasons for the decision. No justices dissented.

The Democratic officials had asked the nation’s highest court to block the state supreme court’s ruling.

The referendum was approved by voters, 52 percent to 48 percent, on April 21. The change in electoral district boundaries was expected to give Democrats a 10-to-1 advantage over Republicans in the state’s U.S. House of Representatives delegation. The delegation currently has six Democrats versus five Republicans.

IT’S OFFICIAL, WE WIN!

“The US Supreme Court moments ago has ruled AGAINST Virginia Democrats when it comes to reviving their pro-Democrat redistricting map ahead of the 2026 midterms.”

WOULD’VE BEEN: 10D-1R
MAP WILL REMAIN AS: 6D-5R

Another Dem embarrassment.

pic.twitter.com/sfWWvumcnJ

— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) May 15, 2026

Don Scott, speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, told the high court in a filing that the state Supreme Court ruling should be stayed because that court was “deeply mistaken on two critical issues of federal law with profound practical importance to the Nation.”

“The decision below violates federal law in two separate ways. First, it predicated its interpretation of the Virginia Constitution on a grave misreading of federal law, which expressly fixes a single day for the ‘election’ of Representatives and Delegates to Congress,” Scott wrote.

The lead respondent, Virginia state Sen. Ryan McDougle, a Republican, who is also legislative commissioner for the Virginia Redistricting Commission, filed a brief in opposition to Scott’s application.

The application is “extraordinary” because it asks the high court to halt a state supreme court’s ruling “on a state constitutional issue governing the state constitutional amendment process, all so that they can redraw congressional districts weeks before early voting begins in the primary.”

Even more extraordinary is what the application omits—“any mention of a deadline for relief, any discussion of the injunction in a separate case that renders the application meaningless, and any federal question providing this Court a basis for review,” the brief said.

Virginia’s highest court on May 8 threw out the voter-approved electoral map that was designed to flip four Republican-held congressional ⁠seats to Democrats, dealing a setback to Democratic hopes of retaking the U.S. House. Republicans also hold ​a majority in the U.S. Senate.

In a 4–3 decision, the Virginia Supreme Court blocked the results of the Democrat-backed ballot measure, finding that Democratic lawmakers had not followed proper procedure last year when they rushed to approve ​the referendum in time to reach the ballot ahead of the November 2026 vote.

Normally, state legislatures redraw congressional maps after the U.S. census takes place every 10 years.

Last year, the redistricting battle started when Texas, with President Donald Trump’s backing, launched its redistricting effort to protect the Republican Party’s narrow majority in the U.S. House. Other state legislatures, including Republican-controlled Florida and Democratic-dominated California and Virginia. State lawmakers in several other states are currently in the process of redrawing their congressional maps.

Those redrawing efforts accelerated after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6–3 on April 29 that race may not be the predominant, overriding reason for how congressional district lines are drawn.

McDougle hailed the new ruling.

“The Supreme Court of the United States has affirmed what we always knew: you cannot violate the Constitution to change the Constitution,” the state lawmaker wrote on X.

Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger, a Democrat, criticized the decision, which she said had the effect of nullifying “the votes of more than three million Virginians.”

“As Governor, I will make sure voters know when and how to cast their votes this year. Because our votes are how we choose the representation we deserve,” she wrote on X.