The Virginia Supreme Court on Friday handed down its 4-3 ruling, which was, predictably, along the most partisan of lines, to invalidate the April 21 redistricting referendum, in which a 51.7 percent majority of the more than 3 million people approved a mid-decade change in congressional district lines.
In plain English: four Republican justices on the state Supreme Court erased the votes of 1,604,276 Virginians from the history books.
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This, as the Tennessee governor just signed a bill gerrymandering the state’s only Democratic district, held, not coincidentally, by a Black man, out of existence, in line with a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling – also along partisan lines, 6-3, with the six Republicans voting in favor – that gives Republican states the power to do whatever the hell they want.
Florida and Louisiana are soon to follow suit.
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A lot of us have known for a long time that the system is rigged; now the rest of you do.
“The Republican-led majority of the Supreme Court of Virginia contorted the plain language of the Constitution and Code of Virginia to give it a meaning that was never intended, which allowed them to reach the wrong legal conclusion that fit their political agenda. The consequences of their error are grave,” Attorney General Jay Jones said.
“My team is carefully reviewing this unprecedented order, and we are evaluating every legal pathway forward to defend the will of the people and protect the integrity of Virginia’s elections,” Jones said.
Great of the AG to say that there, that his team is reviewing the ruling, but, this is it – it’s over.
There’s no appealing to a federal court, without there being a federal issue – which, there won’t be.
It’s not a federal issue that a state’s Supreme Court is made up of MAGA judicial activists; that’s on us.
And even if, what, you think the 6-3 MAGA U.S. Supreme Court is going to override a 4-3 MAGA state court?
Ha!
Today’s news is, literally, Republicans doing whatever the hell they want to, and knowing there’s nothing anybody can do to stop them.
Because you know that the four Republican justices who signed off on this travesty would’ve contorted the reasoning they applied to whiting out the votes of 1,604,276 of us to allow Glenn Youngkin and a Republican majority in the Virginia General Assembly to do what Tennessee just did, and Florida and Louisiana are about to do, and give us 11-0 MAGA maps.
Whatever; the deed is done.
Don Scott, the Virginia House Speaker, seems to want to signal that he gets that; he issued a statement throwing in the towel – saying, twice, that “we respect” the court and its decision, because that’s what you’re supposed to say when you’re in office, though you know that Donald Trump would be doing everything short of outright explicitly encouraging his followers to rampage the Supreme Court building if he was the one on the losing side.
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Not a fan of Don Scott here for just rolling over; the statement he issued is a Chuck Schumer when we needed a Justin Pearson.
And I’ll note here: at this writing, the decision is more than an hour old, and, nothing from Abigail Spanberger, nothing from Scott Surovell, the Senate Majority Leader, nothing from Louise Lucas, though that’s probably because of the FBI raid two days ago, which we can now see was timed to shut her up.
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Tim Kaine weighed in with some fightin’ words.
“Unlike Republican-led states that have redrawn their maps through backroom deals, the Virginia General Assembly let the people decide for themselves in a free and fair election,” Kaine said. “If the Virginia Supreme Court had legitimate concerns about this referendum, the time to stop it would have been before three million Virginians cast their ballots. But the Court let the process move forward, and Virginians sent a message loud and clear: we see President Trump’s brazen power grab in states across the country, and we won’t stand for it.
“The timing of this ruling speaks volumes,” Kaine said. “The U.S. Supreme Court eviscerates the Voting Rights Act in a lawsuit brought by a Jan. 6 extremist, and Southern states race to craft backroom deals disenfranchising minority voters and candidates. Meanwhile, Virginia voters choose to stand up against national disenfranchisement only to see their votes cast into the trash by a 4-3 ruling.
“A sad day, indeed, but I’m proud of Virginians’ willingness to stay true to our state’s motto after 250 years. That spirit is needed now more than ever,” Kaine said.
Who woulda thought, at the end of the day, that the ones to stand up would be Tim Kaine and Jay Jones?
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Chris Graham
