Supreme Court lets California use its new congressional map : NPR

California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks in Los Angeles during a 2025 campaign event on Proposition 50. Voters approved the ballot measure, allowing the state’s Democratic leaders to temporarily override the state’s congressional map to help Democrats win five additional seats in the House of Representatives.

Ethan Swope/AP

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Ethan Swope/AP

The Supreme Court is allowing California to use its new congressional map for this year’s midterm elections, clearing the way for districts across the state as Democrats and Republicans continue their fight for control of the U.S. House of Representatives.

The state’s voters approved the redistricting plan last year as a Democratic counter-response to the new Republican Party of Texas-friendly map, which President Trump pushed for to help Republicans maintain their slim majority in the House.

And in a brief, unsigned order issued Wednesday, the high court rejected an emergency request from the California Republican Party to block the redistricting plan. The state Republican Party argued that the map violated the U.S. Constitution because its creation was primarily motivated by race and not partisan politics. A lower federal court rejected that claim.

The ruling on California’s redistricting plan comes two months after the Supreme Court cleared the way for the Texas map that launched a nationwide gerrymandering fight by boosting the GOP’s chances of winning five additional House seats.

“In preparation for the upcoming 2026 midterm elections, several states have in recent months redrawn their congressional districts in a manner that is expected to favor the state’s dominant political party,” said the court’s December order in the Texas case. “Texas adopted the first new map, and then California responded with its own map with the stated goal of countering what Texas had done.”

The “impetus” for adopting the two states’ maps was “pure partisan advantage,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in a concurring opinion, joined by fellow conservative Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch.

The Supreme Court has already ruled that partisan gerrymandering cannot be reviewed in federal courts.

While the Trump administration supported Republican redistricting of Texas, it opposed California’s redistricting, describing it as “tainted by an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.” The administration claimed the case was different from Texas’ because of the timing of state filing periods and the fact that the California Republican Party and the federal government provided alternative maps that met California’s “stated partisan goals.”

Where California’s map fits into the larger fight over redistricting

Democrats are counting on California’s map to help their party fight Republican gerrymandering in Texas and other states. With rulings upholding both Texas and California’s maps, the end result is that both states could essentially wipe out each other’s partisan gains.

Legal battles continue over other new congressional maps, as Republican-led Florida and Democratic-led Maryland take steps to join the list of states that were redistricted before the midterms.

In New York, Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis and Republican members of the state election board are appealing a state judge’s order for a new redistricting plan that would redraw Malliotakis’ district, which the judge says illegally dilutes the collective power of Black and Latino voters. A reshuffling of the New York-based district could tip it into the Democratic column.

In Utah, two House Republicans have filed a federal lawsuit, claiming that a new congressional map chosen by the state court, which could help Democrats win an additional House seat, violates the U.S. Constitution. Utah’s Republican-controlled state legislature has asked the state’s highest court to block the map for this year’s elections.

And in Virginia, a judge ruled that a proposed constitutional amendment on congressional redistricting violated state law because the process used by the state’s Democratic lawmakers to advance it was improper. Virginia Democrats are appealing the decision.

Redistricting also remains an issue for the Supreme Court this legislature.

It has yet to rule on the challenge to Louisiana’s voting map, but oral arguments in October suggested the court’s conservative majority will likely continue to undermine the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Such a move could lead to new rounds of gerrymandering in Congress — and the biggest drop ever in the representation of black members of Congress.

Edited by Benjamin Swasey