Were he a betting man, Del. Alfonso Lopez told a gathering of seasoned local Democrats recently, he’d wager that the courts will rule that Virginia must hold yet another election for all 100 seats in the House of Delegates in 2022, this one under the lines that eventually will be redrawn to accommodate census data.
Former Del. David Ramadan, who was part of an Arlington Committee of 100 post-election post-mortem two weeks ago, predicted essentially the same thing — it’s probable that the courts will require another House of Delegates election in 2022, followed by the regular one in 2023, he opined.
We’ll see.
Time for each of us to pause for a little prayer to whatever deity works best for you. Please, spare all 8 million of us Virginians an extraneous House of Delegates campaign season next year.
We’d be making this plea no matter which side had won the majority this time around (and it appears to be Republicans). Democrats running the lower house of the legislature, Republicans running it, whatever; just not three delegate elections in a row, please-please-please.
Democrats may press for this, thus giving them a do-over from their rotten (though could have been far worse) results of the election just concluded. Be careful what you wish for, our friends on that side of the aisle – it’s possible there might be a real Republican wave next November, and you could find yourself in an even deeper hole than had you simply maintained the status quo.
This election-election-election trifecta actually played out in the House of Delegates, albeit before our time, in the early 1980s. Was Virginia better off for having experienced it? The truth may be lost to the mists of time, but one is dubious.
Anyway, we’ll see what transpires. And even were it to happen and Democrats won back the House of Delegates majority next November, it wouldn’t matter much, as we’ll have a Republican in the Governor’s Mansion through early 2026 at least. And trust us: Divided government, as noted in several of our editorials of recent vintage, is a good thing.
Editorial: Spare us another legislative election
Were he a betting man, Del. Alfonso Lopez told a gathering of seasoned local Democrats recently, he’d wager that the courts will rule that Virginia must hold yet another election for all 100 seats in the House of Delegates in 2022, this one under the lines that eventually will be redrawn to accommodate census data.
Former Del. David Ramadan, who was part of an Arlington Committee of 100 post-election post-mortem two weeks ago, predicted essentially the same thing — it’s probable that the courts will require another House of Delegates election in 2022, followed by the regular one in 2023, he opined.
We’ll see.
Time for each of us to pause for a little prayer to whatever deity works best for you. Please, spare all 8 million of us Virginians an extraneous House of Delegates campaign season next year.
We’d be making this plea no matter which side had won the majority this time around (and it appears to be Republicans). Democrats running the lower house of the legislature, Republicans running it, whatever; just not three delegate elections in a row, please-please-please.
Democrats may press for this, thus giving them a do-over from their rotten (though could have been far worse) results of the election just concluded. Be careful what you wish for, our friends on that side of the aisle – it’s possible there might be a real Republican wave next November, and you could find yourself in an even deeper hole than had you simply maintained the status quo.
This election-election-election trifecta actually played out in the House of Delegates, albeit before our time, in the early 1980s. Was Virginia better off for having experienced it? The truth may be lost to the mists of time, but one is dubious.
Anyway, we’ll see what transpires. And even were it to happen and Democrats won back the House of Delegates majority next November, it wouldn’t matter much, as we’ll have a Republican in the Governor’s Mansion through early 2026 at least. And trust us: Divided government, as noted in several of our editorials of recent vintage, is a good thing.