Kiggans faces Luria in Virginia Beach; Wittman meets Taylor in the 1st
The 2nd Congressional District, which includes the city of Virginia Beach and the Virginia portion of the Delmarva Peninsula, hosts one of the state’s competitive House races. Republican incumbent Jen Kiggans faces former Rep. Elaine Luria, a Democrat who lost the seat to Kiggans in 2022 after redistricting. Kiggans won that race by less than four percentage points.
The district has passed between Republicans and Democrats several times in the past few decades. In 2024, Kiggans defeated a different Democratic challenger by a margin of less than four percentage points. In the same election, Trump won the district over Kamala Harris by less than one-half of one percentage point. In the 2025 gubernatorial race, the area favored Democrat Abigail Spanberger.
Kiggans, a Navy veteran endorsed by Trump, has campaigned on her record in office and has attacked Luria for opposing a proposal to ban congressional stock trading in 2022, a position Luria reversed this year. Luria, also a Navy veteran, has highlighted her opponent’s support for the U.S. military conflict with Iran, an issue the AP describes as resonant in a district with a significant military population.
Luria, who campaigned alongside Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, had raised about $8 million as of mid-October, according to financial disclosure documents. Kiggans, who campaigned with Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., raised about $7.6 million.
In Virginia’s 1st Congressional District, Rep. Rob Wittman, a nine-term Republican, faces what the AP describes as possibly his most difficult reelection battle yet against Democrat Shannon Taylor, a county prosecutor. The bellwether district in the eastern part of the state, which includes Jamestown, Williamsburg, Yorktown and some of Richmond’s suburbs, reelected Wittman by a margin of nearly 13 percentage points in 2024.
Wittman has asked voters to reelect him so he can continue being a voice for the district in Congress. Taylor has focused her campaign on rooting out corruption in Washington and has painted Wittman as benefiting from a corrupt system. Wittman has raised slightly more money than Taylor — $5.4 million to her $4.6 million — and millions more in outside spending have flowed into the race.
A Democratic win in either congressional race could push the party closer to regaining control of the chamber. Democrats need to win three more seats than in 2024 to claim the majority, and the AP reports the party sees Trump’s plunging approval rating as an opportunity to score wins in competitive districts.
Question 1 would enshrine abortion rights in Virginia’s constitution
Virginia is one of four states with abortion-related measures on the ballot in the 2026 midterm elections. If approved, Question 1 would enshrine reproductive rights in the state constitution, including the right to an abortion.
The amendment would let state lawmakers regulate abortions in the third trimester of pregnancy, but would also require that they be allowed under certain circumstances, including if the fetus is unviable or if necessary to protect the life of the mother. If the amendment passes, it could allow state courts to strike down laws restricting abortion. Virginia is the only southern state that did not enact an abortion ban after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022.
The ACLU of Virginia and Planned Parenthood Advocates of Virginia support the amendment, while the Family Foundation of Virginia and the Virginia Catholic Conference oppose it.
In the U.S. Senate race, three-term Democratic incumbent Sen. Mark Warner is expected to be reelected. He is running against Bert Mizusawa, a Republican and retired Army major general who advised Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Polls close at 7 p.m. ET. The AP will provide vote results and declare winners in races for U.S. Senate, U.S. House, statewide ballot measures, House of Delegates and Arlington County Board.
About 3.4 million votes were cast in Virginia’s 2025 race for governor, and about 42% of those were cast early or by absentee ballot.
Virginia jurisdictions are expected to vary in how and when they release results. The first vote updates of the night are expected to include results from all vote types: early in-person, mail and in-person on Election Day. A small number of jurisdictions may include all or almost all of their early and absentee voting results in their first update of the night, while most counties and cities begin releasing at least some results from in-person Election Day voting in the first update and over the course of the night.
In the 2025 general election for Virginia governor, the AP first reported results at 7:10 p.m. ET, 10 minutes after polls closed. The last vote update of the night was at 1:52 a.m. ET, with more than 99% of total votes counted.
The AP does not make projections and will declare a winner only when it determines there is no scenario that would allow a trailing candidate to close the gap. If a race has not been called, the AP will continue to cover newsworthy developments such as candidate concessions or declarations of victory, and will make clear that it has not yet declared a winner and explain why.
Virginia does not conduct automatic recounts. A recount may be requested if the margin between a candidate and the apparent winner is 1 percentage point or less. A recount may be requested on a ballot question if the margin of victory is 50 votes or fewer, or 1 percentage point or less, whichever is greater. The AP may declare a winner in a race subject to a recount if it can determine the lead is too large for a recount or legal challenge to change the outcome.