Methodology: The VPAP Index ranks each of Virginia's state legislative and congressional districts based on the average of their estimated performance in the 2021 gubernatorial elections and the precinct results from the 2024 presidential election. The results for each year are calculated as the gap between Republican and Democratic performance, then averaged together. For example, if Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin outperformed his Democratic opponent by 15 percentage points in 2021, and the former President Donald Trump outperformed Vice President Kamala Harris by 5 percentage points in 2024, the district would be listed as the average of those numbers, "+10R."
The Index is based on reallocated precinct results from 2024, but uses estimated results from 2021. Estimation is necessary because election officials do not publish gubernatorial results by legislative district. Calculating results by legislative district requires complete precinct-level results. But elevated early voting in 2021 — one in three ballots cast — means that complete precinct results were unavailable in most Virginia localities. Early votes were tabulated in a centralized system at a locality level. Most localities could not reallocate the early votes back to the geographic precincts where voters live.
VPAP developed a method to reallocate 2021 absentee votes back to precincts. We compared our results with other methods and concluded that ours produces a reasonably accurate estimate of results by legislative and congressional districts.