Republicans just got bad news about one of their worst gerrymanders in Virginia

https://thinkprogress.org/republican-gerrymander-virginia-bethune-hill-2d8f6e453738/

Ian Millhiser
Dec 8, 2018, 12:14 pm

Virginia’s House of Delegates is one of the most gerrymandered bodies in the country. In 2017, Democrats won the statewide popular vote in Virginia’s legislative races by over nine percentage points. Nevertheless, Republicans still held a 51-49 majority in the House of Delegates, thanks to gerrymandering.

But Virginia Democrats may actually get to compete in something approximating free and fair elections next year, thanks to a pair of documents handed down by a federal court on Friday.

Both documents arise from a case entitled Bethune-Hill v. Virginia State Board of Elections. This case, which was originally filed in 2014, alleges that 12 of the state’s House of Delegates districts are unlawful racial gerrymanders.

Though the case has been through several twists and turns since 2014, including a trip up to the Supreme Court, two members of a three-judge panel eventually concluded that 11 of the state’s districts are, indeed, illegal gerrymanders.

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