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On Redistricting, Will Virginia Democrats Surrender, or Get Creative?

Democrats must stop conceding that the only answer for various racist voting laws is that Democrats just have to vote more and harder and better.

Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger at an event in Woodbridge, promoting the redistricting measure that was on the ballot in April.

We try to keep despair out of these pages, tough as the times are. That’s why I didn’t write about Friday’s Virginia Supreme Court’s decision striking down new voter-approved congressional maps for extremely dubious reasons (read Virginia political expert Carolyn Fiddler’s awesome explanation of the ruling here).

Coming after the Supreme Court (of the United States) decision invalidating Louisiana’s congressional maps for taking race into account, the Bayou State’s immediately postponing upcoming elections as a result, and Tennessee’s swift move to use the SCOTUS ruling to wipe a majority-Black congressional district literally off the political map, last week was the worst for voting rights since the court’s 2013 Shelby v. Holder ruling struck down two vital sections of the Voting Rights Act. I admit to not seeing much light down this tunnel that afternoon.

The Supreme Court Just Made Its Voting Rights Ruling Even Worse Elie Mystal

The Supreme Court Just Made Its Voting Rights Ruling Even Worse

Adding to my dismay on Friday, Virginia Democratic leaders came out against the court’s ruling, but seemed resigned to let its Republican majority undo the will of state voters.

“I am disappointed by the Supreme Court of Virginia’s ruling,” Governor Abigail Spanberger, a centrist who initially opposed the redistricting push, then supported it, said in a statement. “But my focus as Governor will be on ensuring that all voters have the information necessary to make their voices heard this November in the midterm elections because in those elections we—the voters—will have the final say.” Democratic House speaker Don Scott echoed Spanberger: “We respect the court.”

Let me pause here and say: I don’t respect that court, or its outcome-driven reasoning. And I am sick and tired of Democrats conceding that the only answer for various racist laws—Jim Crow redistricting, onerous voter ID, now a GOP-dominated state Supreme Court overturning the will of Virginia’s voters—is that Democrats just have to vote more and harder and better. Because that basically........

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