After record losses, Virginia Republicans look to pick up the pieces

Virginia Republicans lost more than a dozen seats in the state’s legislature and all three statewide elections in 2025. Now, in 2026, they hope to make a blazing comeback, thanks in part to a Democratic-led redistricting effort they think will be the spark that lights the fire.

“At the end of 2025, I thought we discovered the floor, but we discovered the basement,” said Matthew Hurt, chair of the Arlington Republican Party, speaking to how Virginia Republicans fared in the 2025 Virginia elections.

“It was pretty demoralizing,” he added.

But now, with a potential new cause to animate their base, Hurt and others are looking to recreate a Virginia they once knew, one dominated by Republicans in Richmond and D.C. Much of this renewed excitement comes from the ongoing redistricting ballot referendum that could see a majority of Virginia’s congressional district seats flip to Democrats via a political gerrymander.

And in the wake of heavy losses, Hurt said it’s given local parties like his renewed vigor and the chance to experiment.

“It divides Arlington into two different congressional districts; in Fairfax it is divided into five different congressional districts," Hurt said of the localized signs his party created.

"I think our message is resonating in Arlington, and it's very different from the messaging we’re seeing across the state and the Republican Party of Virginia has facilitated the ability for unit committees to drive our own messaging points," he told Radio IQ.

Jeff Ryer is the Chair of the Republican Party of Virginia — he was elected following November’s losses. He too said the redistricting amendment was inspiring a base that may have sat out last year.

“This campaign has been driven by grassroots so far; they’re the ones who stepped up. That’s why, depending on where you live, you may see a different type of ‘Vote No’ sign," Ryer said. "Because they are going to know what best is going to appeal to their voters.”

Elevating local needs is something Bedford Delegate Tim Griffin, one of the newer and younger members of the Virginia House Republican Caucus, also sees as a way back to the majority.

“I don’t ever say, 'Ok, I can change the world.' I say, 'I can change Bedford County, I can change Amherst County, I can change Nelson County,'" Griffin told Radio IQ.

And, once again, that local angle is showing up in their effort to quash redistricting.

“Last weekend, I was just writing post cards with our local GOP unit to send out to people. They’ll be sent from the Nelson County Post Office to Nelson County voters," Griffin said of 'Vote No' efforts he's helped with in his district. "And I think that’s a strong contrast to people who were posting on X that they were getting postcards from people in California.”

On the policy side, Griffin said “kitchen table” issues need to be front and center.

“People that are in their 20s or 30s, where they get out of school and they feel like, ‘What do I do now? I can’t get a job that’s going to pay for a house, I can’t afford to get married, I can’t afford to have kids,’" he said. "And so, I think that the focus needs to be back on those things.”

Griffin is also among Republicans who back President Donald Trump’s effort to clamp down on immigration.

“The American dream is for Americans. It can’t be for everybody in the world; it has to be for people who live here,” he said.

That line may work in Griffin’s majority white and rural Western Virginia district. But in Northern Virginia, where racial and ethnic diversity has exploded, Hurt said the Arlington GOP has embraced the change.

“Many first-generation Americans who came through a legal process are very comfortable with strict immigration regulations and those are the individuals who know most about the process,” he said, noting candidates his party has put on the ballot are from a range of ethnic and cultural backgrounds.

That regional split is likely among issues Virginia Republicans will have to face in the coming years. But for Larry Sabato with the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, there’s a much bigger problem: President Doanld Trump.

“The Republican Party here, as in other places, faces a terrible dilemma," Sabato told Radio IQ. "If they don’t side with him on the big things, he gets furious and turns off the spigot of the national money for the state and so on. But if they do go with him, it makes it much more difficult for them to win.”

Trump’s policies, from federal job cuts to cuts to health care and food assistance, changes to college loan accounts, mass deportations, the war with Iran and a spike in gas prices, continue to dominate headlines. For Sabato, there’s a lot to keep Trump front of mind in a state the president lost three times.

“He’s in the news 50 times a day and at least half of those are new controversies," he said. "He’s not going to become more popular in Virginia; he’s only going to become less popular and he’s already very unpopular.”

Still, Sabato doesn’t think all hope is lost. Trump should be out of office after 2028, and Virginia’s next gubernatorial race happens in 2029.

“It only takes a year for a Democratic president to become unpopular in Virginia," he said. "So, they’ll have a shot if they can get a good ticket together.”