In light of President Joe Biden’s recently announced withdrawal from the presidential race, here are some frequently asked questions — and answers about the Virginia ballot.
1. Is it too late for Kamala Harris to make the ballot in Virginia?
No. The deadline for presidential candidates to qualify for the ballot in Virginia is Aug. 23.
As far as Virginia law is concerned, Vice President Harris isn’t replacing President Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee because Biden hadn’t been formally nominated yet, so officially, there’s no one to replace.
Democrats had been planning a virtual roll call next week to nominate a candidate to meet the filing deadlines in some states. Their convention, set for Aug. 19-22, comes after some of those deadlines have passed.
2. Would Harris’ nomination invalidate Democratic primary results?
Technically, when Democratic primary voters were marking ballots for Biden, they were choosing who their state’s convention delegates should support and how they should be allocated. This is roughly akin to how the Electoral College works in general elections: Voters don’t elect a president, they elect electors who do. In this case, Biden is releasing his pledged convention delegates to vote for whomever they choose. Whether Biden’s withdrawal invalidates the will of Democratic primary voters is ultimately a political question. Keep in mind he had only token opposition for the nomination. In Virginia, the results of the March presidential primary were Biden 88.5%, self-help author Marianne Williamson 8.4%, and Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips 3.5%.
For context: We’ve gotten accustomed to national conventions that simply ratify primary results but, historically speaking, presidential primaries that bind convention delegates are a relatively recent invention. For most of American history, it was convention delegates who decided on whom to nominate, which is why some of those old-time conventions went on for multiple ballots. The 1924 Democratic convention took a record 103 ballots before the delegates nominated John Davis, who went on to lose to President Calvin Coolidge. The last time we had a national convention where the outcome was in doubt until the convention was the 1976 Republican convention, where Gerald Ford ultimately triumphed over Ronald Reagan.
3. Who else will be on the presidential ballot in Virginia?
We don’t know yet, because the deadline hasn’t passed. Donald Trump and the Democratic nominee, presumably Harris, will be on the ballot. Since 1976, the Libertarian Party nominee has made the Virginia ballot every year except one (1984). Others who are possible, but not confirmed yet, are independent Robert Kennedy Jr., independent Cornell West, and the Green Party’s Jill Stein.
Keep in mind that Virginia’s presidential ballot typically includes more candidates than just the Democratic and Republican nominees. Virginia hasn’t had a two-person race since Herbert Hoover and Al Smith in 1928. The record was 1936 when there were seven presidential candidates on the ballot. More recently, there were three candidates on the Virginia ballot in 2020, five in 2016, five in 2012, six in 2008, four in 2004 and six in 2000.
4. Wasn’t the deadline to make the ballot back in June?
That was the deadline for everything other than the presidential race. That means the ballots for U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives, and various local offices are already set. (There is a recount for the 5th District Republican nomination set for August 1 plus a separate legal challenge to Chris Faraldi’s victory over Peter Alexander in the Ward IV Republican primary city council race in Lynchburg that goes to trial Aug. 9. In both cases, courts have indicated they will resolve those in August, long before the ballots must be printed.)
The only exceptions to that June 18 deadline are for the presidential election and special elections, such as the one that Salem will have in November to fill the unexpired term of Sheriff April Staton, who has resigned.
5. Where can I find a list of who’s on the ballot?
We have lists for localities in Southwest and Southside Virginia on our voter guide. For a full list statewide, see the State Board of Elections.
6. When does voting start?
In Virginia, early voting begins September 20. For details and other voter information, see our voter guide.
