Former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is predicting that the states highest court will ultimately side with a lower-court judge who has just thrown out the results of a controversial mid-decade redistricting referendum.
According to The Western Journal, Cuccinelli appeared on CNN with anchor Jake Tapper after Tazewell County Circuit Court Judge Jack Hurley issued an injunction late Wednesday that effectively nullified Tuesdays statewide vote. Virginians had narrowly approved the Democrats redistricting measure, with roughly 51.5 percent voting in favor and 48.5 percent opposed, a change that would shift the current 6-5 partisan balance in the states U.S. House delegation to a potential 10-1 advantage for Democrats.
Judge Hurleys order was sweeping and unambiguous, declaring, Any and all votes for or against the proposed constitutional amendment in the April 21, 2026, special election are ineffective.
He further held that the referendum question was void ab initio a Latin term meaning from the beginning, signaling that in his view the measure was legally defective before a single ballot was cast.
When Tapper pressed him about the ruling, Cuccinelli, a Republican and former top law-enforcement officer for the state, cautioned that the legal battle is far from over. He acknowledged that a trial court win is good, but emphasized that the decisive word will come from the Virginia Supreme Court, which now must confront the underlying constitutional questions Democrats tried to sidestep.
This is not the first time Judge Hurley has intervened in the case, which centers on Democrats attempt to push through a mid-decade remap outside the normal redistricting cycle. In January, he issued a preliminary injunction blocking the ballot measure from going forward, only to see the states high court later allow the election to proceed on a limited basis.
The Virginia Supreme Court ruled in March that the special election could take place, but it carefully avoided ruling on the core legal issues raised by opponents of the amendment, the Associated Press reported. The court still has not ruled on whether the mid-decade redistricting amendment and referendum are legal, indicating that the scheduled April vote could be all for nothing if the top court upholds a lower court ruling blocking the effort, the Associated Press said at the time.
Cuccinelli told Tapper that observers should not misread the Supreme Courts earlier decision to let the vote occur as a sign that the justices approve of the Democrats tactics. Theres a reason the Supreme Court held off until after the vote. Over 100 years of Virginia legal precedent says that the vote in a referendum is part of the legislative process. Its analogous to a governor signing a bill. You dont sue on a bill that hasnt passed yet, he said.
The former attorney general said he expects the high court to act swiftly now that the referendum has been held and Judge Hurley has ruled. I think its highly likely this will be overturned, probably in May, Cuccinelli contended, suggesting that Democrats attempt to engineer a near one-party congressional map could be short-lived.
Cuccinelli argued that the referendum flagrantly violated the states constitutional process in four distinct ways, each of which he believes is fatal to the amendment. They have to win all four of them to hold on to this referendum. I just dont think they can do it, he said, underscoring how high the legal bar is for the measures supporters.
There are some very basic processes in the Constitution for amending the Constitution that they ignored, Cuccinelli elaborated, accusing Democrats of cutting procedural corners for partisan gain.
They [the Democrats] were ignoring the will of the people in how they brought this forward. And now were going to have this decided in the Virginia Supreme Court. I wouldnt be surprised to see a 7-0 ruling throwing this out.
In a detailed social media post on Tuesday, Cuccinelli laid out the four constitutional defects he says plague the amendment. First, he noted that the proposal to redraw congressional districts was advanced as a constitutional amendment during a special legislative session last fall that had been called to address the state budget, a subject-matter limitation he says lawmakers were not free to ignore.
Expanding it to include a constitutional amendment on redistricting required a two-thirds vote that never occurred, Cuccinelli wrote, arguing that Democrats lacked the supermajority needed to broaden the sessions scope. Second, he pointed out that the Virginia Constitution requires an amendment to be approved by two separate votes of the legislature with an intervening election, yet early voting in last falls election was already underway when the General Assembly took the second vote.
Cuccinelli further wrote that the state charter mandates that every electoral district shall be composed of contiguous and compact territory, a standard he says the new maps plainly fail to meet.
He explained that the proposed congressional maps violate this contiguity requirement (rather badly), in part by creating sprawling districts that snake out of Democrat-heavy northern Virginia around Washington, D.C., and extend far to the south.
Finally, he cited a timing requirement that he says Democrats also disregarded in their rush to lock in a decade-long advantage. The Virginia Constitution, he wrote, requires the amendment be submitted to voters not sooner than ninety days after final passage by the General Assembly. The timeline from the second passage to the April 21 vote did not satisfy this requirement.
Judge Hurley referenced several of these same constitutional concerns in his January ruling that initially halted the referendum.
His latest order, issued after voters had already gone to the polls, now sets up a direct confrontation between the trial courts reading of the state constitution and the Democrats aggressive redistricting gambit.
Cuccinelli told Newsmax that the Virginia Supreme Court has been moving at lightning speed in a case that was already on its docket before Tuesdays election. He said oral arguments are scheduled for Monday, meaning the justices could soon determine whether Democrats mid-decade power play stands or whether Virginias constitutional safeguards against partisan manipulation of the map still carry real force.
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