MAGA went into meltdown after voters in Virginia turned against Donald Trump in a critical referendum that could sway the result of the midterm elections.
Virginians approved a Democratic plan to allow them to redraw the state congressional map for the remainder of the decade. Subject to a state Supreme Court hearing later this week, the plan could give the party as many as four extra seats in the House come November.
The result means that Trump’s calls for redistricting in Republican-led states—which MAGA raced to back at the time—are now backfiring on the president as Democratic states rush to follow suit.
After 97 percent of the votes were counted, 51.5 percent voted yes to redistricting, while 48.5 percent voted no.
The proposed map means Democrats could possibly win 10 of Virginia’s 11 congressional districts, a handy boost from the current 6-5 split in the Virginia House delegation, as Republicans fight to hold onto power.
Trump administration officials stuck to the script after the defeat, describing it as an exercise in gerrymandering: altering electoral district boundaries to give one party an advantage over their rival.
Speaker Mike Johnson called the results “egregious”, claiming 46-percent of Virginia voters backed Trump. “That is why Democrats relied on rigging the ballot question in order to win. We fought this effort with money, manpower, and in the courts - and those fights will continue.”
Johnson claimed Democrats broke “the law” in order to “force their radical, unwanted agenda down the throats of every American.”
Former President Barack Obama recorded TV ads in favor of the ‘yes’ vote in Virginia, which led to Republicans calling out his past comments against gerrymandering, saying it led to political polarization that makes it “harder and harder to find common ground.”
Former DHS spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin shared Obama’s X post on Tuesday which thanked Virginians for “showing us what it looks like to stand up for our democracy and fight back.”
McLaughlin wrote: “Disenfranchising millions of voters and forcing 45-percent of Virginians to be represented by 1 congressional district and 55-percent represented by 10 is now ‘standing up for Democracy.’ Is that ‘equity’? What a farce.”
Fox News host Mark Levin also reacted to Obama’s post, calling him an “unconscionable liar, Obama” and vented about the result, saying, “You just disenfranchised hundreds of thousands of voters. Disgusting.”
MAGA conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer complained that “Democrats are stealing Virginia”—and also blamed Obama. She addedm “Virginia is about to become uninhabitable.”
Glenn Youngkin, the former Republican governor of Virginia, campaigned heavily for the ‘no’ vote. “Thank you to all the voters who turned out to vote against this egregious power grab,” he posted on X. “I urge the Virginia Supreme Court to rule against this unconstitutional process that will disenfranchise millions of Virginians.”
Indeed, several sour Republicans also pinned their hopes on the state’s Supreme Court, which is considering whether the plan is illegal and could through the result out.
“This is not over. I think the courts will rule in our favor,” Julie Perry, who is running for Congress in Virginia, posted on X. “Remember, the Virginia Supreme Court hears this case on Thursday.”
NewsNation host Katie Pavlich was trying to find positives in the result, posting on her X account that “the lobster isn’t cooked yet! It may get thrown out by the Virginia Supreme Court. The Democrat redistricting power grab has already been slapped down by a judge.”
Lawyer, and former acting deputy secretary at the Department of Homeland Security, Ken Cuccinelli also weighed in on this week’s Supreme Court appeal, posting on X, “By the way folks, this is going to move FAST - not the usual “court speed”.
Other MAGA figures attacked Abigail Spanberger, the Democrat elected governor of Virginia last November.
Spanberger posted after the result that Virginia’s voters had “pushed back against a President who claims he is ‘entitled’ to more Republican seats in Congress.”
Fox News host Laura Ingraham shared the governor’s post and added, “You’re a fraud and you campaigned against what you did tonight—only for power. Virginia is gone."
Conservative CNN commentator Scott Jennings parroted Johnson’s language, calling the results “egregious,” and claimed Virginia previously had “the fairest maps in the nation.”
“I‘m not surprised that the ‘yes’ vote won,” Jennings said. “They had all the money and all the lies. And sometimes in politics, when you’ve got those two things, you can put something over the line, even something as egregious as this.”
He said the new maps were “a complete joke, everybody knows it.”
Former Fox News star Geraldo Rivera told CNN, “I think that gerrymandering is a cancer on politics, I don’t understand how it made it into the constitution... I think it’s really obscene.”
Video of Fox News host Jesse Watters begrudgingly reading out the live result of the Democrat victory was contrasted online against his comments from last year. “We have to gerrymander to the tilt,” he said of Republicans in 2025. “Why? Because the Democratic Party cannot be trusted to be the opposition anymore, they have to have a permanent minority.”
While some Republicans blamed Democrats, reformed MAGA supporter Marjorie Taylor Greene made a long, impassioned post after the results, blaming her former hero turned nemesis Donald Trump, for losing his supporter base.
Greene said, “A once red state is turning into one of the bluest states because people don’t want to support Republicans now.”
“Trump betraying the America First wing of MAGA is going to have devastating consequences in the midterms,” the former Georgia congresswoman wrote on X.
“I’ve been warning of this all along,” she stated, blaming Trump for starting his war on Iran, leading to rising fuel prices, as well as his stalling on the release of the Epstein files.
The Republican said these were “some of the top issues that has caused a revolt on the right and a mass exodus of America First Trump voters.”
She told MAGA to “stop lapping up their meaningless words,” adding: “Our loved military is once again fighting in the Middle East, your money is paying for Israel’s war, and once again people will suffer and die.”
Journalist Rachel Bade also said the “GOP blame game” was in full swing in Virginia after the “botched” result for the party.
Bade said local Virginia Republicans blamed everyone from Trump to the RNC, but noted on X that “Whomever they blame, they agreed on one thing: that national GOP leaders were asleep at the wheel when they were outgunned by the Dems.”
Meanwhile, Trump spent Tuesday evening posting on Truth Social about his war with Iran after again extending a ceasefire.
