Mount Vernon, VA – Virginia Senate Majority Leader Scott Surovell released the following statement on the results of the redistricting referendum:
“Tonight, Virginians did what Virginians have always done: they answered a question about the nature of our democracy, and they answered it in favor of the people.
In 1788, it was here in Virginia that Madison, Mason, and Henry debated whether this new Constitution could truly safeguard self-government. The compact they helped forge rested on a single, radical premise: that legitimate power flows from the consent of the governed, not from those who seek to entrench themselves against the will of voters. Virginia did not simply ratify the Constitution. Virginia shaped it, insisted on a Bill of Rights, and set the standard that representation must answer to the people.
That is the tradition Virginians honored tonight.
Faced with unprecedented gerrymandering in other states, naked attempts to decide elections before a single vote is cast, Virginians refused to stand idle. They voted to reclaim the founding principle that maps should reflect communities, not protect incumbents, and that Congress should be chosen by voters, not the other way around.
President Trump told the country that if Democrats wanted change in Washington, we would have to win more House seats. Tonight, Virginians answered him in the same clear voice Patrick Henry used more than two centuries ago: the people will decide.
Fairness won. Accountability won. And the Commonwealth that gave America its Constitution has once again reminded the nation what that Constitution is for.”
