DEMOCRATS CAN DO THIS
Proposed Virginia Constitutional Amendments
Protecting Reproductive Rights: This amendment is about protecting the privacy, dignity, and autonomy of all Virginians and ensuring our Commonwealth has legal protections amid shifting federal policies and national uncertainties regarding reproductive rights. Virginians should be able to access the full range of reproductive healthcare without fear of government interference or discrimination.
Repealing Same-Sex Marriage Ban: This amendment will remove Virginia’s outdated language banning same-sex marriage. We will ensure all families feel welcome and supported in our Commonwealth and where everyone is free to marry who they love with dignity, equality, and respect.
Restoring Voting Rights: This amendment will establish a transparent process for restoring voting rights to individuals with felony convictions and promote both fairness and inclusivity in our electoral system. Virginia is the only state that requires returning citizens to petition individually for voting rights restoration. This amendment fixes that, ensuring that every Virginian has the opportunity to participate in our democracy after completing their sentence.
These constitutional amendments must be passed by the General Assembly twice (once in the year prior to state legislature elections and once in the year after an election has occurred) before being put on the ballot for voters to consider. This means that hopefully these amendments will be on your ballots during the 2026 midterm elections!
Virginia General Assembly Resources:
General Assembly Website: this link will take you to the homepage of the GA’s website.
GA Quick Links List: contains a bunch of useful links to frequently accessed pages on the General Assembly’s website. Includes links to House and Senate member, district, and committee listings; House and Senate committee/floor livestreams; House and Senate Committee Agendas; and meeting schedules.
Legislative Information System (LIS): LIS is the public-facing legislative tracking website. You can go here to find information on bills (bill text, bill history, bill chief patrons/co-patrons, etc), committee referrals, daily floor calendars, and basic information about legislators.
VA Code: Official site of the Code of Virginia. Contains all the laws currently in effect.
VA Budget: The official site for the Virginia Budget. Contains information on the budget bills and budget amendments.
Georgetown Law’s Virginia Resources Legislative Process Guide: provides a general overview of how the legislative process works in Virginia.
JMU’s General Assembly Guidebook: contains an overview of the Virginia General Assembly and several useful links regarding committees, tracking legislation, and explanations on how to comment and participate in legislative hearings (both in and out of normal session).
HOD Committee Lists: contains committee membership lists, meeting times, agendas, reports, and clerk contacts.
Senate Committee Lists: contains membership lists, meeting times, and agendas.
House of Delegates Livestream: Where you can go to find archived live streams for all HOD committee/subcommittee meetings as well as each day’s floor session (titled ‘Regular Session’ in the lists). Just use the calendar function to select a specific day.
Senate Livestream: archived live streams of Senate committee and floor sessions. There’s no sorting function, so I recommend using the ‘ctrl+f’ function to find what committee/subcommittee meeting you’re looking for.
Who’s My Legislator?: search tool to determine which legislator represents a certain address. Input an address and it will show you that address’s Virginia House and Senate representatives as well as those in the U.S. House and Senate.
State-Level Advocacy Organizations:
ACLU of Virginia: the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union.
NAACP Virginia: the Virginia chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Virginia NOW: the Virginia chapter of the National Organization for Women.
LWW Virginia: the Virginia chapter of the League of Women Voters.
Indivisible: this organization began with an activism guide written in 2016 after Donald Trump’s first election. Today, Indivisible is an activist organization and resource provider that offers strategic leadership, movement coordination, and support to Indivisible activists, and also directly lobbies Congress, builds partnerships, runs media campaigns, and develops advocacy strategies.
Sister District: acts as an expansion of Democratic campaign field and fundraising programs with the goal of winning state legislative elections. Organizes volunteers to write postcards to voters, canvass, phonebank, textbank, and raise money on behalf of amazing Democratic candidates.
Virginia’s List: Virginia's List (formerly Women Leaders of Virginia) is a Political Action Committee with a mission to elect progressive women to the Virginia General Assembly and statewide elected offices.
Rural GroundGame: Rural GroundGame began as a response to a need to support rural Democrats. Today, it supports local Democratic committees and campaigns across rural Virginia by providing direct support in the form of staff time, trainings, and access to tools for committees to engage with their communities and win elections.
Freedom Virginia: Freedom Virginia is a nonpartisan nonprofit organization committed to building a Commonwealth where all Virginia families have the freedom to thrive. Freedom Virginia advances economic security policies through grassroots activism, voter engagement, and legislative advocacy.
Equality Virginia: Equality Virginia advocates and organizes across Virginia in support of LGBTQ+ individuals.
VA Democrats LGBTQ+ Resource List: an LGBTQ+ organization and resource list put together by the Virginia Democrats.
New Virginia Majority: a major civic engagement organization, NVM organizes in communities year-round for racial, economic, and environmental justice through political education, mass-scale voter outreach, mobilization, and intensive leadership development around dozens of issues. Notable for their canvassing efforts during elections.
Repro Rising (Formerly NARAL Virginia): Repro Rising Virginia supports and protects laws and advocacy efforts that protect every person’s bodily autonomy, reproductive freedom, and access to the full continuum of sexual and reproductive healthcare. They also engage in sex education, leadership training, and other programs to advance reproductive freedom, combat stigma, and promote sound public policy.
Voices for Virginia’s Children: Voices for Virginia’s Children champions public policies and legislation that achieve positive and equitable outcomes for young people. Their work encompasses several topics, including child welfare, economic security, education, mental health, and health equity.
Clean Virginia: works to advance clean energy and good governance in Virginia by fighting utility monopoly corruption in Virginia politics.
Virginia Conservation Network: VCN is committed to building a powerful, diverse, and highly-coordinated conservation movement focused on protecting our Commonwealth’s natural resources. The VCN network is composed of over 150 partners across Virginia and works on a wide range of issues, organized into four main categories: Healthy Rivers, Clean Energy and Climate, Land Conservation, and Land Use and Transportation.
Virginia League of Conservation Voters: Works to protect natural resources important to all Virginians: clean air, clean water, and public lands.
The Nature Conservancy: the Virginia chapter of the Nature Conservancy, an environmental non-profit advocacy organization with the mission of conserving the lands and waters “on which all life depends."