Category: Electoral process
-
A Slippery Slope Down to Dark Backroom Deals
by Chris Braunlich Unless Virginia voters reject the constitutional amendment on the ballot April 21, gerrymandering will return to Virginia. Five years ago, 66% of Virginia voters — 2.8 million Virginians — approved a bipartisan redistricting constitutional amendment ending gerrymandering. The result was a map that is widely regarded as one of the fairest in…
-
Referendum Ad Wars
by Kerry Dougherty Look who’s doing dabbling in investigative journalism! It’s my old employer, The Virginian-Pilot. Yep, they were so stunned by “Vote No” campaign literature aimed at black voters on the upcoming redistricting referendum, that they went digging. Figures. In a story headlined “Who’s Behind An Anti-Redistricting Flyer Invoking Jim Crow?” the paper asked…
-
ERIC is Back
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Despite professing concern for election integrity, former Gov. Youngkin pulled Virginia out of Electronic Registration Information Center, Inc., (ERIC), an organization developed to enable states to share data in order to clean up their election rolls and identify people who might try to vote in different states. The General Assembly has passed,…
-
Democrat Groups Invest $19 Million to Pass Redistricting Referendum
by Ken Reid Republicans have so far failed to get the state courts to stop an April 21 referendum to suspend bipartisan redistricting and enable the Democrat-controlled General Assembly to draw new maps to give them a 10-1 advantage in U.S. House races this fall. And it would also seem Republicans are at a disadvantage…
-
When a Weary Party Makes Its Stand
The April 21 redistricting referendum will be a test of courage worthy of the Commonwealth’s Founding Generation. by David Botkins There are moments when the question before us as Republicans and as Virginians is not simply what we believe, but whether we still have the courage to act on those beliefs. We are in such…
-
New Democratic Districts Invite Republicans to Vote
by Chris Saxman Proverb If you can’t beat them, join them and as George Bailey said in It’s a Wonderful Life: This is a very interesting situation Having seen three different polls (one public and two private) that show the constitutional amendment to re-gerrymander Virginia’s congressional districts is under 50%, the odds of its passage…
-
Follow-up on Voter Registration Rolls Suit
by Dick Hall-Sizemore There was considerable reaction to my recent article regarding the U.S. Dept. of Justice suing Virginia for not turning over an unredacted copy of the statewide list of registered voters. Two comments in particular struck me as needing some response from me. Matt Hurt posed this question: “The National Voter Registration Act of 1993…
-
April 21: Not Really What Virginia Needs Now
by Gordon C. Morse Want a political version of blunt force trauma? Then welcome to Virginia’s April 21 referendum on congressional redistricting. Look at the map and behold the winners. No one has to be fair about “fairness.” It’s “temporary,” they keep saying. Temporary — as in, it won’t last long. You could say as…
-
Give Us Your Voter Registration Rolls
by Dick Hall-Sizemore The Trump administration has sued the Commonwealth of Virginia for refusing to turn over its voting registration rolls to the U.S. Dept. of Justice (DOJ). The Commonwealth is not alone. Currently, the administration has sued 24 states and the District of Columbia for refusing the demand. The states sued were primarily those…
-
The Death of Fair Representation
Every partisan-drawn map is an insult, but Virginia’s is the most insulting. by Derrick A. Max There is a difference between redistricting and rigging. One is a constitutional necessity. The other is political temptation. Right now, Virginia stands at the crossroads between the two. On April 21st the voters will decide which way we turn. Using current…
-
Same Controversy, New Plaintiffs, New Arguments
by Steve Emmert (Steve Emmert, who formerly published the Virginia Appellate News & Analysis blog, offered this legal perspective on Virginia’s redistricting debate. — JAB) I continue to believe that the impetus for this new filing was a recognition by the plaintiffs’ lawyers that the judge’s original order last month contained everything they wanted except…
-
Restore “Fairness”? Fairness to Whom?
by Ken Reid The Republican National Committee (RNC), and Virginia U.S. House Reps. Morgan Griffith, R-9, and Ben Cline, R-6, announced Feb. 18 a second challenge to the Democrat-controlled General Assembly’s April 21 ballot measure to suspend bipartisan redistricting – which passed in 2020 by a roughly 65-35 margin – so the GA can gerrymander…
-
Virginia Dems Lose Leftist Media Support Over Gerrymandering
by Kerry Dougherty Maybe, just maybe, Virginia Democrats have gone too far. Their lopsided congressional district map, designed to create safe districts for handpicked Dem candidates may simply be too brazen to get a nod from voters in April. Looks like brazen election rigging is a bridge too far for the leftist fan club of…
-
Gutting Two Constitutions To Rig Future Elections
by Derrick A. Max In a dizzying display of power, the Democrats in the General Assembly voted this week to assign Virginia’s electoral college votes to the Presidential candidate who wins voter-dense urban and suburban areas in other states nationwide. They also voted to approve a gerrymandered congressional map that will give progressive and populous…
-
Gerrymandering in Virginia is a Strategic Blunder for Democrats
Democrats are asking voters to protect democracy by abandoning America’s most sacred of democratic principles: that voters get to choose their politicians, and that elections mean something. by Alex Keena Last year, President Donald Trump started a new “redistricting war” when he pressured Republicans in Texas to redraw their state’s congressional district map to help…