Democrats Aren’t Done, File New Appeal After Virginia Map Struck Down – Full Article

Under the Democratic-backed map, five congressional districts would have been centered in heavily Democratic Northern Virginia. Changes to four additional districts spanning Richmond, southern Virginia, and the Hampton Roads region would have weakened the influence of conservative voting blocs in those areas. Another redesigned district in western Virginia would have combined three Democratic-leaning college towns in an effort to counterbalance Republican-leaning voters elsewhere in the region.

Virginia’s seven Supreme Court justices are appointed by the state legislature, which in recent years has alternated between Democratic, Republican, and divided control. Legal analysts have said the court is not widely viewed as having a fixed ideological alignment, NBC4 reported.