Early voting for this year's midterm elections begins Sept. 18 in the Commonwealth, when Virginians can cast their votes in federal elections for the Commonwealth’s U.S. Senator and members of the U.S. House of Representatives. Charlottesville residents can vote for the U.S. Representative of Virginia’s fifth congressional district — which includes Charlottesville and parts of Albemarle County. Virginians will also have the opportunity to weigh in on amendments to the Virginia Constitution affirming the right to reproductive freedom and same-sex marriage, as well as an amendment granting convicted felons the right to vote upon their release. University students may register to vote in Charlottesville or Albemarle County with their University address.
Primaries for the federal elections were held Aug. 4. While there was no Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate race, Bert Mizusawa, a retired major general and senior Pentagon executive, beat out two challengers in the Virginia Republican primary — securing 51.49 percent of the vote and the Republican nomination.
In Virginia primary races for the fifth district’s House election, both general election candidates handily beat out challengers and won their respective primaries, with candidate Tom Perriello winning 76.76 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary, and Rep. John McGuire (R-VA5) taking 84.24 percent of votes in the Republican primary.
Here is a closer look at what is on the ballot this November in Virginia’s elections for the U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives and amendments to the Virginia Constitution.
U.S. Senate
Mark Warner (VA-D), three-term senior U.S. senator from Virginia and former governor of the Commonwealth, will face Republican nominee Bert Mizusawa in the election for Senator of the Commonwealth. Mizusawa formerly served as a national security advisor to President Trump in 2016, and has secured the president’s nomination in the election.
Warner announced July 24 that this would be his final re-election bid, and his campaign has focused on affordability, lowering healthcare costs and planning for a future economy impacted by artificial intelligence. He has been endorsed by Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D) and other Democratic leaders in the state.
Mizusawa’s campaign is also centered around increasing affordability, though with a different approach than Warner, pledging to oppose any tax increase for Virginians. Mizusawa has also said he will work to decrease the national debt, defend military and veterans’ benefits and strengthen the border.
The election will likely result in a Warner victory, with Pollsmax predicting that the Senator will win the election by nearly 20 percentage points, and the Center for Politics ranking it as a “safe D.”
U.S. House of Representatives
Elections are occurring across all of the Commonwealth’s 11 House districts. Charlottesville lies in Virginia’s fifth congressional district, where democratic nominee Tom Perriello will face Republican incumbent John McGuire in November’s general election.
The race for the House is shaping up to be much more competitive than the Senate — Pollsmax showed McGuire with a 7 percentage point lead over Perriello as of Aug. 1 — but the Center for Politics still rates the fifth district as a “likely Republican” victory. The predicted deficit mirrors Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s (D) loss to Winsome Earle-Sears in the district by just over 7 percentage points in last November’s gubernatorial election.
McGuire has represented Virginia’s fifth district since Jan. 3, 2025, and is seeking his second congressional term. He is a former Navy SEAL and previously represented Virginia’s 10th district in the State Senate from January 2024 to January 2025. McGuire has been endorsed by President Trump and according to his congressional website, he is focused on “keeping costs low for families,” decreasing the size of the federal government and supporting the nation’s agriculture base and “robust” infrastructure development.
Periello formerly represented Virginia’s fifth district from 2009 to 2011, and in the time since his Congressional term has worked as a non-profit executive and diplomat, serving as the U.S. special envoy to Sudan from February 2024 to January 2025. His 2008 victory in the fifth district — in which he unseated six-term incumbent Virgil Goode — was called an upset by Time Magazine, and he remains the last Democrat to hold the seat 15 years after the end of his term.
Periello has been endorsed by Spanberger, as well as local Charlottesville and Albemarle leadership, including Charlottesville Mayor Juandiego Wade and the Albemarle County Board of Supervisors. His campaign priorities include “saving families money” by ending tariffs and ending the war in Iran. Periello also vows to take on corruption, bring “sanity” back to Washington and fight to increase the affordability of healthcare, childcare, housing and retirement.
Commonwealth Constitutional Amendments
Commonwealth ballots in November will have three “ballot questions” pertaining to proposed amendments to the Virginia Constitution.
Ballot Question 1 asks voters to vote “yes” or “no” to adding an amendment to the Virginia Constitution’s Bill of Rights that would explicitly protect “the freedom to make personal decisions” about reproductive healthcare such as birth control, prenatal care, childbirth, abortion, miscarriages and fertility. The amendment would also protect doctors and nurses from “being punished” for their role in these decisions, and bans third-trimester abortions except in the cases where the pregnancy is not viable or threatens the patient’s health.
Currently, the Virginia Constitution does not explicitly grant or ban the right to reproductive freedom. If the amendment passes it would solidify the right for Virginians in the wake of the legal gray area that has existed since the 2022 overturning of Roe v. Wade, which ended federal protections for abortion and sent the question of reproductive freedom back to state governments to decide their laws on the matter.
Ballot Question 2 asks Virginians to vote to amend the Constitution to affirm the right to same-sex marriage. Voting “yes” to the amendment would remove a current provision in the state’s Constitution that defines marriage as “only a union between one man and one woman.”
The ban is currently unenforceable due to the Supreme Court case Obergefell v. Hodges, which grants the right to same-sex marriage federally. However, if Obergefell were ever to be overturned, the amendment would guarantee that the right to marriage for all would still continue to exist in Virginia.
Ballot Question 3 concerns the right of released felons to vote. Under the Virginia Constitution, once a person is convicted of a felony, they lose the right to vote for the rest of their life, unless the right is restored by the governor. In January, a federal court ruled that individuals convicted of a felony only lose their voting rights if they committed a felony recognized at common law in 1870.
A vote “yes” on the ballot question would create an amendment to the Virginia Constitution that would grant the right to vote to felons upon their release from incarceration.
Sales Tax
Residents of Albemarle County will have the opportunity to vote for a 1 percent increase in sales tax in the County to help fund school construction projects.
How to Vote
Residents of the Commonwealth can vote early in-person in these elections and for the amendments from Sept. 18 to Oct. 31, and can request a mail-in ballot until Oct. 23. The final day to register to vote is Oct. 23, but residents can still request a provisional ballot on Election day — Nov. 3.
If students would like to register to vote in Virginia, they must fill out a Virginia Voter Registration Application — which can be downloaded from the Virginia Department of Elections website — and mail it to their local voter registration office. Students can also register online, via an online registration form on the Virginia Department of Elections Website, or obtain a voter registration form from their local voter registration office, which can be found by entering their address into the Virginia Department of Elections portal, and fill it out in person. Dorms and other student housing addresses are acceptable to list on the voter registration form.
University classes will not be held on election day, and The Cavalier Daily will cover election day updates.
Abigail Larkin is a staff writer on the news desk. She is a third-year student in the Batten School of Public Policy, majoring in public policy and foreign affairs. Abigail is from Norfolk, Va., and she enjoys writing about state and national politics.
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