Tuesday’s redistricting election in Virginia was a win for Democrats, but the outcome was close. Since last November’s Democratic wins for governor and in the state legislature, the state’s progressives are feeling emboldened, but it wasn’t long ago that they had an unpleasant surprise with Terry McAuliffe’s 2021 defeat by Glenn Youngkin. AOC said McAuliffe’s loss showed “the limits of trying to run a…super moderated campaign that does not excite, speak to, or energize a progressive base.”
Described as a “narrow victory” by the New York Times, Tuesday’s outcome is a reminder that Virginia is not a partisan state that either side should take for granted. There were no exit polls from the redistricting election so we can’t see how independents voted nor the composition of the electorate. But with historical exit polls that we have, the chart below shows how Virginia is trending politically.
Unlike national Democrats who fell as a percentage of the electorate from 2020-2024, Virginia Democrats have remained steady as a percentage of the state electorate (36%). There has been some drop in self-identified Republicans (34% in 2021 to 31% in 2025) with a subsequent increase in independents (30% in 2021 to 33% in 2025). Democrats have a party ID advantage, but these proportions indicate Virginia is not a solid blue state.
Ideologically, liberals have increased by 10 from 2021 (23%) to 2025 (33%), but the ideological makeup of the state is evenly distributed. There are slightly more conservatives (35%) than liberals (33%) but with moderates (33%) comprising a third of the Virginia electorate.
In the 2021 gubernatorial election, Youngkin improved upon Trump’s 2020 margins among Republicans and conservatives and in key majority coalition groups like independents, while McAuliffe maintained the status quo among Democrats and liberals, losing ground in the middle. Youngkin won independent/something else by 9 (54-45) compared to Biden winning them by 19 in 2020 – a 28-point swing.
Last November, Abigail Spanberger ran a very successful gubernatorial campaign, winning by 19 among independents, reversing Youngkin’s win in the middle and achieving the same margin as Biden won among this group in 2020. With signs that her vote coalition was recreating the 2020 Biden coalition, we had described her victory as the “wakeup call that Republicans needed for 2026.”
Comparing Tuesday’s results with the 2025 gubernatorial race, there is a double-digit gap between the margins for Spanberger (15) and the redistricting vote (3). Even in the liberal bastions of Northern Virginia, Tuesday’s “yes” margins did not match Spanberger’s 2025 performance.
As we are seeing nationally and in states like Virginia, elections are being won and lost in the middle.
