High court OKs Virginia vote under redrawn map

WASHINGTON — Virginians will elect members of the House of Delegates this year using a map seen as favorable to Democrats as a result of a ruling Monday by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The political boundaries are important because Republicans currently control the House by a slim majority. Only four states are having legislative elections this year. Virginia is the only one where Democrats have a chance of flipping control of the House and Senate.

The high court’s 5-4 decision was perhaps telegraphed by the fact that the justices previously allowed election planning to go forward with the new map. Virginia held its primary last week, and the November general election will be the last time the state uses this map because legislative districts will need to be redrawn to account for results from the 2020 census.

The justices let stand a lower court decision putting the new map in place, saying the Republican-controlled state House did not have a right to represent the state’s interests in an appeal to the Supreme Court. The state could have decided to bring the case but did not, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote.

“One House of its bicameral legislature cannot alone continue the litigation against the will of its partners in the legislative process,” she wrote. The four justices joining her were Clarence Thomas, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Neil Gorsuch, a lineup that included conservatives and liberals. Dissenting were Chief Justice John Roberts and justices Samuel Alito, Stephen Breyer and Brett Kavanaugh.