The Virginia Legislature's 2012 redistricting of the adjacent 3rd district was found unconstitutional and replaced with a court-ordered redistricting on January 16, 2016 for the 2016 elections.
The district spans across much of Central Virginia including all of Orange, Culpeper, Goochland, Louisa, Nottoway, Amelia, and Powhatan counties. The district also includes large portions of Chesterfield and Henrico counties in the suburbs of Richmond. However, Richmond is not currently in the 7th. Spotsylvania County also has a large portion in the 7th district just outside of Fredericksburg Prior to 1993, the 7th District stretched from the fringes of the Washington, D.C. suburbs to Charlottesville. It included the far northern portion of the Shenandoah Valley, as well as Manassas and Fredericksburg. The district's current configuration dates from 1993, when Virginia was forced to create a majority-minority district by a Justice Department directive. At that time, most of Richmond, which had been entirely in the old 3rd District for over a century, was shifted to a newly created 3rd District. The remaining territory in the old 3rd was combined with some more rural areas to the north to form the new 7th District. From 2013 to 2017, the 7th District stretched from the west end of Richmond through the wealthier portions of Henrico and Chesterfield counties before taking in all of Goochland, Hanover, Louisa, New Kent, Orange, Culpeper, Page and Rappahannock counties and a portion of Spotsylvania County.
Demographics
According to the United States Census Bureau's 2017 data for Virginia's 7th Congressional District, the total population of the district is 790,084. Median age for the district is 39.7 years. 65.5% of the district is Non-Hispanic White, 18.4% Black, 5.1% Asian, 0.3% Native American or Alaskan, and 3.4% some other race with 7.3% Hispanic or Latino. Owner-occupied housing is 73.0% and renter-occupied housing is 27.0%. The median value of single-family owner-occupied homes is $266,500. 91.6% of the district population has at least a high school diploma, 40.4% at least a bachelor's degree or higher. 9.1% of the district are civilian veterans. 9.1% are foreign born and 11.9% speak a language other than English at home. 9.9% are of disability status. 68.2% of the district is in the labor force, which consists of those 16 years and older. Mean travel time to work is 29.3 minutes. Median household income is $77,533. Per capita income is $37,567. 5.3% of the population account for families living below the poverty level, and 7.7% of individuals live below the poverty level. 9.5% of Children live below the poverty line.
