Virginia continues the broken record of this year’s redistricting storyline — growth in urban and suburban areas and shrinking population in the rural areas.  The four districts which have the highest excess population are the four districts (First, Eighth, Tenth, and Eleventh) that contain parts of Loudon County, Fairfax County, and Prince William County in the Washington, D.C. suburbs.  The other two districts with excess population are the districts (Fourth and Seventh) that take in part of the Richmond area.  The other five districts have shortages with the biggest shortage being in the Ninth District in southwestern Virginia.

For this cycle, Virginia has opted to use a hybird commission (part legislative members and part citizen members) to draft plans which will then go to an up-down vote by the legislature.  If this process fails, the courts will draw the lines.  Because of the change in the process, it is unclear whether the results will be based on the old map or if the commission will draw the maps from scratch.  For now, I am assuming the the current maps will be the starting point.  The criteria encourages that the lines respect communities of interest, but do not require that the lines follow existing political subdivisions.  In terms of the Voting Rights Act, the Third District (part of southeastern Virginia near Norfolk) and the Fourth District (southeastern Virginia and Richmond) are half-white/half-African American districts and the Eighth District (Arlington and Alexandria) and the Eleventh District (central Fairfax County and eastern Prince William County) are minority-majority (although just barely) districts with no dominant minority group.

I started in the southwest as the Ninth has the biggest shortfall.  I gave the Ninth District the rest of Henry County (currently split with the Fifth District) and more of Roanoake County (currently split with the Sixth District).   To make up for its losses (and its own shortfall) the Fifth District (a large blob that essentially splits the state from the southern border up to the D.C. suburbs) gains Amelia County and Greenville County.  The Second District (eastern Virginia) gains part of Chesapeake County (from the Fourth District) as does the Third District.  The Fifth District will probably gain some from the Fourth District in its southern part along the border as well as chunks from the Seventh District.  (I am seeing Greenville County, Nodaway County, and Amelia County going to the Fifth District along with additional parts of Fauquier County.)  The Fourth District would gain additional parts of Chesterfield County to make up for its losses.   To make up for its losses, the Sixth District will gain Frederick County and part of Winchester County from the Tenth District.  The Seventh District will gain territory in Farquier County and Prince William County from the First District to make up for the loss which in turn will gain other parts of Prince William County from the Eleventh District.  And finally, the Eighth and Eleventh will shift slightly to the north and west in Fairfax County.

The new maps do not significantly change the current partisan balance in Virginia.  The Second District and Seventh District (currently both held by Democrats) remain swing districts.  The balance in the Second District stays almost exactly the same, and the Seventh District may be 1-2% more Republican.  Now, if the Democrats had control of the process, there would be more room to tweek the map.  If you are willing to accept some split counties, you could make the Seventh from a district that slightly favors Republicans to one that slightly favors Democrats but at the expense of putting the First District a little further out of reach.  In Virginia, the issue is 2022 vs. 2030.  The northern parts of the First and Seventh Districts will probably become bluer.  So you can draw lines that make them pink now in the hopes of picking up both by 2030 or can lock in the two as a split now.

The ultimate reality is that the current map slightly favors the Republicans.  It is a 5-4-2 map (five Democrats, 4 Republican, and two swing districts) in which the Republicans need to get around 48% of the vote state-wide to get a 6-5 majority in the delegation.  By making more significant changes to the map, I was able to lock in the current 7-4 split.  The pushes the First District out of Prince William County so that the Seventh can reach those Democratic voters and it moves Republican voters from the Fourth into the First creating a First District that runs from the Northeastern Corner through a gap in Southeastern Virginia between the Second and Third to the east and the Fourth and Fifth to the west.  The effect of the changes would bring the Second and Seventh Districts (the median districts) closer to the state-wide average (maybe 1% more favorable to the Republicans than the state-wide average compared to their current 4% more favorable to the Republicans than the state-wide average).  To make the Second and Seventh into lean Democrat districts, the Third and Fourth would merely be safe Democratic Districts rather than solid Democrat districts and there would be a slight reduction in minority votes, but both would still be minority influence districts.  Similarly, there would be a slight reduction in minority votes in both the Eighth and the Eleventh, but both would still be minority influence districts.  This change reflects the one problem that the Voting Rights Act has posed to Democrats across the South.  In many urban areas, you have a mix of white progressives and minority votes.  It is hard to draw districts that avoid putting a large number of white progressives in districts that are majority minority and when the two groups are combined into one district, you get an 80% Democrat districts which is why it easy for Republicans to pack Democrats into a disproportionately small number of districts.

This summary of the state of play in Virginia represents the last of the states that stayed even after the 2020 Census.  The remainder of this series will look at the seven states that a seat after the census.  The delay in releasing the results have created two different approaches to the process.  One group of states have drawn a set of lines based on population estimates (similar to the way that these posts have been doing).  These states will make the adjustments needed to their initial drafts when the final numbers are released.  Other states have put redistricting on hold (or have only done preliminary hearings with no maps) until they get the final numbers.  One complaint that has already arisen is that Democratic-controlled states have implemented rules to make gerrymandering harder while the Republican-controlled states seem to be going for the most gerrymandered maps that they can.  Of course, this reflects what most other countries would already tell us.  The drawing of lines for the national legislature needs to be subject to the control of the national government so that the process is uniform nationally.  Another reason to pass the For the People Act even if that requires reforming the filibuster.