As Californians decide fate of Prop. 50, GOP states push their own redistricting plans

WASHINGTON- Rushed efforts to overhaul California’s congressional districts have attracted national attention, generated large sums of money and revived hope among Democrats that the effort could help counter a wave of Republican redistricting initiatives pushed by President Trump.

But if Democrats succeed in California, the question remains: Will it be enough to shift the balance of power in Congress?

To regain control of the House, Democrats must flip three Republican seats in next year’s midterm elections. That slim margin prompted the White House to push Republicans this summer to redraw Republican state maps in an effort to keep Democrats in the minority.

Texas was the first to signal that it would follow Trump’s executive order and sparked a rare mid-decade redistricting arms race that quickly reached California, where Gov. Gavin Newsom designed Proposition 50 to exploit his state’s massive inventory of congressional seats.

Californians appear poised to approve the measure Tuesday. If they do, Democrats could potentially gain five seats in the House — an outcome that would mostly offset the Republican effort in Texas that has already passed.

While Democrats and Republicans in other states have also decided to redraw their maps, it’s too early to tell which party will see a net gain, or predict voter sentiment a year from now, when a lopsided election one way or the other could make the redraw unnecessary.

GOP leaders in North Carolina and Missouri approved new maps that will likely give the GOP a new seat in each, Ohio Republicans could gain two more seats in a newly redrawn map approved Friday, and GOP leaders in Indiana, Louisiana, Kansas and Florida are considering or taking steps to redraw their maps. In total, these measures could lead to at least 10 new Republican seats, according to experts who track redistricting efforts.

To counter this, Virginia Democrats passed a constitutional amendment that, if approved by voters, would give lawmakers the power and ability to redraw a new map before next year’s elections. Illinois leaders are weighing their redistricting options and New York has filed a lawsuit seeking to redraw a GOP-held district. But concerns about legal challenges have already dampened the party’s efforts in Maryland, and potential dilution of the black vote has slowed efforts in Illinois.

So far, partisan maneuvering seems to favor the Republicans.

“Democrats can’t get out of their gerrymandering problem. The math just doesn’t hold up,” said David Daly, a senior researcher at the nonprofit FairVote. “They don’t have enough opportunities or enough goals.”

Complex factors for Democrats

Democrats have more than just political calculus to weigh. In many states, they are hampered by a mix of constitutional restrictions, legal deadlines and the fact that many of their state maps can no longer be easily redrawn for partisan purposes. In California, Proposition 50 marks a departure from the state’s commitment to independent redistricting.

Democrats’ hesitation in states like Maryland and Illinois also underscores simmering tensions within the party as it tries to maximize its partisan advantage and establish a House majority that could thwart Trump in his final two years in office.

“Despite deeply shared frustrations about the state of our country, mid-cycle redistricting for Maryland presents a reality in which the legal risks are too high, the timetable for action is dangerous, the downside risk for Democrats is catastrophic, and the certainty of our existing map would be undermined,” Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson wrote in a letter to state lawmakers last week..

In Illinois, black Democrats are expressing concerns about these plans and pledging to oppose maps that would reduce the share of black voters in congressional districts where they have historically prevailed.

“I can’t look at this as a short-term fight. I have to think about the long-term consequences of doing something like this,” said Sen. Willie Preston, chairman of the Illinois Senate Black Caucus.

Adding to these concerns is the possibility that the Supreme Court’s conservative majority will weaken a key provision of the landmark Voting Rights Act and limit lawmakers’ ability to consider race when redrawing maps. The outcome – and its effect on the 2026 midterm elections – will depend heavily on the timing and scope of the court’s decision.

The court has been asked to rule on the case by January, but a decision could come later. Timing is everything, as many states have deadlines for 2026 congressional elections or hold their primary elections in the spring and summer.

If the court strikes down that provision, known as Section 2, advocacy groups estimate that Republicans could win at least a dozen House seats in southern states.

“I think all of these things are going to contribute to whatever legislatures decide to do,” said Kareem Crayton, vice president of the Brennan Center for Justice. The impending court decision, he added, constitutes “an additional layer of uncertainty in an already uncertain moment.”

Republican-led states move forward

Support for Proposition 50 brought in more than $114 million, support from some of the party’s biggest luminaries, including former President Obama, and a boost for national Democrats who want to regain control of Congress after the midterms.

In an email to supporters Monday, Newsom said fundraising goals had been met and asked supporters of the effort to get involved in other states.

“I’ll ask you to help others – states like Indiana, North Carolina, South Carolina and others are all trying to stop Republican redistricting efforts in the middle of the decade. We’ll talk about that soon,” Newsom wrote.

Indiana Republican Gov. Mike Braun has called a special session, set to begin Monday, to “protect Hoosiers from efforts in other states that seek to diminish their voice in Washington and ensure their representation in Congress is fair.”

In Kansas, the Republican president of the state Senate said last week there were enough Republican signatures in the chamber to call a special session to redraw the state’s maps. State House Republicans should try just as hard to move forward.

In Louisiana, Republicans who control the Legislature voted last week to postpone the 2026 primary election. The move is intended to give lawmakers more time to redraw the maps in the event the Supreme Court rules in the federal voting case.

If the justices strike down the practice of drawing districts based on race, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, has indicated the state would likely jump into the mid-decade redistricting race.

Shaniqua McClendon, head of Vote Save America, said the Republican Party’s sweeping redistricting campaign underscores why Democrats should follow California’s lead — even if they don’t like the tactic.

“Democrats need to get serious about what’s at stake. I know they don’t like the means, but we need to think about the end,” McClendon said. “We have to be able to take back the House – that’s the only way we can hold Trump accountable.”

In New York, a lawsuit filed last week accusing a congressional district of disenfranchising Black and Latino voters would be a “Hail Mary” for Democrats hoping to improve their chances in the 2026 midterms, FairVote’s Daly said.

Utah also could give Democrats an outside opportunity to win a seat, said Dave Wasserman, congressional forecaster for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. A court ruling this summer forced Utah’s Republican leaders to redraw the state’s congressional map, creating two districts that Democrats could potentially flip.

Wasserman described the various redistricting efforts as an “arms race…Democrats are using what Republicans did in Texas to justify California, and Republicans are using California to justify their actions in other states.”

“Political tribalism”

Some political observers said the California election result could inspire even more political maneuvering in other states.

“I think the passage of Proposition 50 in California could show other states that voters could support redistricting in the middle of the decade when it’s needed, when they’re under attack,” said Jeffrey Wice, a professor at New York Law School, where he directs the New York Institute of Elections, Census and Redistricting. “I think it would definitely provide impetus for places like New York to move forward.”

Like California, New York would have to ask voters to approve a constitutional amendment, but that might not happen in time for the midterm elections.

“It might also encourage Republican states that have been hesitant to say, ‘Well, if California voters support redistricting in the middle of the decade, maybe they’ll support it here, too,'” Wice said.

For Erik Nisbet, director of the Center for Communication and Public Policy at Northwestern University, the idea that the mid-decade redistricting trend is gaining ground is part of a larger problem.

“It’s a symptom of this 20-year trend of increasing polarization and political tribalism,” he said. “And unfortunately, our tribalism is now flaring up, not only between each other, but also between states. »

He argued that both parties sacrifice democratic norms and ideas of procedural fairness as well as representative democracy for political ends.

“I worry about the final outcome of this case,” he said.

Ceballos reported from Washington, Mehta from Los Angeles.