The Texas House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a Republican-led redistricting bill stalled by Democratic members’ walkout, paving the way for a new congressional map that could help the GOP secure a larger House majority ahead of the 2026 midterms.
The State House in a 88-52 vote approved the redistricting bill, which Democratic lawmakers had delayed for two weeks by fleeing via private jet to Illinois. After the Democrats returned on Monday, their Republican colleagues advanced an updated version of the original bill out of two committees. The revised map still seeks to flip five House seats but has placed more Republican voters in existing GOP districts, according to the New York Times.
The bill now heads to the Texas Senate, where Republicans have an even larger majority, with a vote scheduled for Thursday. Texas governor Greg Abbott (R.) is expected to sign the bill into law. The new map would help the GOP defend its slim majority in the U.S. House during the 2026 midterms.
“The underlying goal of this plan is straightforward: improve Republican political performance,” state representative Todd Ames Hunter (R.) said Wednesday as he introduced the bill, noting that the Supreme Court allows consideration of political performance in the map-drawing process.
Democrats have sought to counter Texas Republicans’ proposal by launching redistricting efforts of their own, particularly in California and New York. But unlike Texas—where the Legislature can revise district lines any time with no constraints—many Democratic-led states have constitutional limits on when and how redistricting can occur. California’s laws, for example, require a ballot measure to change the redistricting method, while in New York, “the earliest the lines could be redrawn would be 2028,” the Times reported.
California governor Gavin Newsom (D.) last week unveiled a ballot measure that would give his state’s Democratic-controlled Legislature the power to redraw congressional boundaries set by California’s independent map-drawing commission. Newsom’s gerrymandering push comes even as a poll released last week showed that 64 percent of California voters—including 61 percent of Democrats—want the independent commission to determine the state’s congressional map.
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Author: Matthew Xiao
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