Back in January 2026, U.S. District Court Judge John Gabney ruled that Virginia must allow felons to register to vote unless they were convicted of an offense that was a “common-law felony” in 1870. The basis for this ruling was that when Virginia was readmitted to the Union, the readmission act specified that Virginia could not curtail anyone’s voting rights except for individuals who had been convicted of a “common-law” felony. The 2026 ruling determined that there are only eleven such felonies.

Since then, Virginia elections officials have prepared their own list of crimes that it believes were “common-law” felonies back in 1870. The state’s list includes 284 crimes.

On August 19, the Judge ruled that the state’s list is far too expansive, and he repeated his own ruling that there are only eleven such types of crimes. See the ruling here.