SHAMELESS: Democrats Suggest Nuking a State Supreme Court in Mad Pursuit of Redistricting Power
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before. Democrats are scheming to pack a court after justices clearly upheld the law in opposition to their agenda.
No, it isn’t the U.S. Supreme Court, for once. Instead, it’s Virginia’s highest court—and Democrats’ lawless scheme is positively Machiavellian.
When the Virginia Supreme Court rightly struck down Old Dominion Democrats’ constitutional amendment on redistricting, Democrats responded by… scheming to effectively nuke the Virginia Supreme Court.
According to a bombshell report from The New York Times published Sunday, Democrats who represent Virginia in the U.S. House of Representatives held a private discussion with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.
Democrats’ Cockamamie Scheme
Democrats on the call discussed “an unusual gambit to replace the entire state Supreme Court, with a goal of reinstating their gerrymandered map,” the Times reported.
The strategy would involve “having Democrats in Richmond lower the mandatory retirement age for state Supreme Court justices.” The General Assembly, controlled by Democrats, would have to lower the mandatory retirement age from 75 to 54, the age of the youngest current justice.
Since the General Assembly appoints the justices, the Democrat majorities in both chambers would then fill vacancies with sympathetic Democrat lawyers.
This strategy would essentially nuke the Old Dominion’s highest court, removing every single member and replacing them with yes-men.
A Sign of Desperation
Democrats’ Machiavellian manipulation has been on display throughout this entire process, but this scheme still represents a horrifying escalation.
In 2020, Virginians overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment to create a bipartisan committee to handle redistricting. The bill passed the Legislature before and after an election, and then Virginia voters overwhelmingly approved it, 65.7% to 34.3%.
Last year, “moderate” Abigail Spanberger initially said she had no plans to reconsider redistricting, but—after a hefty political campaign contribution from Obama-era Attorney General Eric Holder’s pro-redistricting PAC—she abruptly reversed course.
Spanberger’s effort immediately hit a snag, however. In order to reverse a constitutional amendment, you need… another constitutional amendment. Virginia’s Constitution requires the Legislature to pass a new constitutional amendment before and after a general election—to give the people the ability to vote out the Legislature if they oppose the amendment—and a popular referendum to confirm the amendment.
Even though Democrats knew this, they rushed a vote before Election Day last year. This clearly violated the rules because millions of Virginians had already voted, so the Legislature’s approval for redistricting couldn’t count as the vote before an election.
Even so, Democrats acted as though that vote counted, held another vote this year, and rushed the amendment before the general public. They drew the maps to have Northern Virginia fit into five different congressional districts in a blatant attempt to squeeze out Republicans.
Democrats pulled out all the stops. They adopted arguably deceptive language suggesting the ballot initiative was about “fairness.” They enlisted former President Barack Obama to gaslight Virginia voters with nauseating ads about returning to a “level playing field.”
Despite all this, Virginians narrowly approved the measure, 51.7% to 48.3%.
Republicans went to court to challenge the legality of this scheme, but Democrats repeatedly argued that the courts should not block it before it went to the voters.
Democrat Attorney General Jay Jones praised the Supreme Court of Virginia for allowing the April 21 vote to proceed while considering the case.
Ultimately, the Virginia Supreme Court flatly stated the truth: the redistricting amendment clearly violated the constitution, and cannot go into effect. Even more revealing, the justice who wrote the opinion was none other than D. Arthur Kelsey, who had been appointed to an appeals court by Democrat Gov. Mark Warner in 2002.
Jones hyperbolically claimed that the decision “silences the voices of the millions of Virginians who cast their ballots.”
In an utterly farcical move, Democrats sought to appeal the case—a state constitution case decided by the state‘s highest court—to the U.S. Supreme Court, which arguably has no jurisdiction whatsoever. It also didn’t help that Jones’ office misspelled “Virginia” and “senator” in the filing…
Nuking the Virginia Supreme Court
Of course, even if Democrats can convince the Virginia Legislature to set the retirement age at the absurdly low number of 54 and vote to pack the Virginia Supreme Court—a tall order—it would be far too late.
The commissioner of the Virginia Department of Elections identified a date past which state election officials cannot change redistricting maps: May 12. In other words, Virginia Democrats would have to pass the retirement age legislation, enforce it, appoint new justices, confirm them, and have them reverse the Virginia Supreme Court decision… in less than 48 hours.
Yet the very fact that Democrats still mentioned this plan, and seem to seriously be considering it, speaks volumes.
One of them, U.S. Rep. Suhas Subramanyam, was willing to go on the record to The New York Times, urging his fellow Democrats to “have a strong stomach right now.”
Let’s get this straight: Democrats ignored the state constitution in their blatant power grab, flagrantly lied to get the measure across the finish line, undermined their own ability to complain when the Supreme Court threw out racial redistricting, and now are talking about court-packing in order to resurrect their illegal scheme.
Democrats are willing to destroy any institution if it will check their blatant grasp for power. Yet this strategy seems far more likely to backfire.
Do Democrats truly have no shame?
