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Shannon Taylor wins Democratic primary in Virginia’s 1st District

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Shannon Taylor has won the Democratic primary in Virginia’s 1st District, CBS News projects, defeating six other candidates seeking the chance to unseat incumbent GOP Rep. Rob Wittman. He’s held the seat since 2007 and has President Trump’s endorsement. 

Taylor, the Commonwealth’s attorney for Henrico County, was the front-runner in the race. The 1st District extends across the Richmond suburbs and north and west into rural counties in the state, and also includes Williamsburg, Jamestown and Yorktown. 

The House Democrats’ campaign arm, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, saw Taylor as a top-tier candidate and gave her fundraising and organizational support as part of its Red to Blue program, an effort to win GOP-held seats. Virginia’s Democratic U.S. senators, Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, have also both endorsed Taylor, as has Gov. Abigail Spanberger.

The 1st District is rated “lean Republican” by the Cook Political Report, and it backed Mr. Trump by 5 points in 2024.

Public interest lawyer Salaam Bhatti, community advocate Tom Cywinski, healthcare attorney Ericka Kopp, small law firm owner Mel Tull, Army veteran Elizabeth Dempsey Beggs and Navy officer Jason Knapp also ran for the Democratic nomination.

Earlier this year, Virginia voters approved a new congressional map that would have given Democrats an advantage in 10 House districts, leaving only a single seat safe for Republicans. But the state Supreme Court tossed the map, restoring the original districts. Currently, the state’s U.S. House delegation is split, with six Democrats and five Republicans. 

Supreme Court backs Trump’s order to curb mail ballots

By CNN
(CNN) — The Supreme Court on Monday said that President Donald Trump could begin carrying out parts of an executive order intended to restrict mail voting, but additional legal challenges could hinder implementation of his plan before the November midterm election.The ruling injects new uncertainty about the voting rules for the midterms by keeping alive the possibility that Trump will impose policies outlined in the March order that gave the US Postal Service and the Department of Homeland Security unprecedented roles in the running of elections.The high court’s ruling, handed down in an unsigned order over the dissent of the court’s three liberals, means that the Trump administration may move forward with a proposal for DHS to compile state-specific lists of people it believes are eligible to vote in the Democratic-led states that had challenged the plan in court.Another part of Trump’s executive order instructs the Postal Service to impose new mandates on states that want to send ballots through the mail, requiring that they submit their own lists of eligible voters to the agency and include information on ballot envelopes to allow those ballots to be tracked. The justices gave USPS the green light to implement that aspect of Trump’s plan, but a lower court blocked that effort nationwide in a separate case. That means more court action will likely be needed before the USPS can move forward.The Supreme Court’s decision did not address the legality of Trump’s order, only the timing of the challenge to it. Trump for years has made baseless claims about widespread voter fraud while specifically attempting to undermine confidence in mail voting.“The court’s disposition of this application does not mean that any measure taken by the government to implement the order will necessarily be lawful,” the court wrote. “On that score, time will tell. But the order itself does not harm the states, so the District Court lacked jurisdiction to bar the govern­ment from trying to implement it. And for the reasons dis­cussed, that injunction is likely to irreparably harm the government if it remains in place while the appellate pro­cess runs its course.”And it represents a loss for the Democratic states, who warned they will need to immediately begin diverting time and resources away from preparing for this year’s elections, which are fewer than three months away.Election cases have become particularly contentious this year at the Supreme Court, drawing sharp writing from members of both the conservative and liberal wings. In the highest profile case, the court’s 6-3 conservative majority gutted the Voting Rights Act in a significant ruling in late April dealing with Louisiana’s congressional districts.“The ruling is a win for Trump for the moment, but it doesn’t fully clear the way for his effort to limit mail-in ballots to go into effect. There’s already a separate injunction against the executive order that’s not directly affected by today’s ruling, and as soon as tomorrow, a Massachusetts district court may block the underlying USPS rule at issue—which is the real thing to watch heading into November.”This story is breaking and will be updated.The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
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