The U.S. Supreme Court has turned aside Virginia Democrats’ long-shot attempt to overturn state courts and force the use of their preferred congressional district map in November’s elections.
The justices rejected Attorney General Jay Jones’ request without comment, and no justices signaled any dissent.
That outcome was expected, but is still devastating for Democrats who’d been counting on Virginia to deliver them as many as four extra U.S. House seats in the election.
Virginia’s Supreme Court had ruled that Democrats who controlled the legislature violated the Constitution with a referendum trying to overturn the old maps. Referendums must pass the legislature twice, with an intervening election, before being put to voters, and the state Supreme Court said lawmakers didn’t allow for a full election in between.
Mr. Jones had argued to the federal justices that the state court had stretched the definition of Election Day too far.
But his attempt to get the U.S. justices to intervene had a number of hurdles, including that the matter was one of state law and interpretation.
The calendar had also worked against him, with election officials saying they needed to have final maps done by earlier this week.
Under the current map, Democrats hold six of the state’s 11 seats in the House. They had hoped to turn that into a 10-1 advantage.
Even under the current map, though, they are hopeful of winning eight of the 11.
Some Virginia Democrats had talked about another Hail Mary option of passing a law to force the retirement of all of the state’s justices, then installing a new court more amendable to Democrats’ plans.
That idea has lost steam in recent days.
