Federal judges block Texas from using redrawn congressional map

A panel of three federal judges on Tuesday blocked Texas from using a new congressional map drawn by Republicans in hopes of securing the party additional seats in the 2026 midterm elections, ruling 2-1 that the map in question appeared to constitute an illegal, race-based gerrymander. 

"The public perception of this case is that it's about politics," U.S. District Judge Jeffrey V. Brown, a Trump appointee, said in the majority opinion, joined by U.S. District Judge David Guaderrama, an Obama appointee. 

"To be sure, politics played a role in drawing the 2025 map," the judges said. "But it was much more than just politics. Substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered the 2025 map."

Judge Jerry Smith, a Reagan appointee, dissented without explanation.

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The ruling is a significant blow to the Trump administration. It comes as President Donald Trump and his Republican allies have raced to pad the party's razor-thin House majority in the run-up to the 2026 midterm elections - including by imploring some states to launch rare, mid-decade redistricting efforts. 

As part of that push, legislators in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio have each redrawn their congressional maps. 

Other states, including Florida and Kansas, are currently weighing similar efforts. 

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton vowed on Tuesday to appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court for review. He said Texas would also be seeking an emergency stay from the high court to would temporarily stay the lower court's ruling. 

"For years, Democrats have engaged in partisan redistricting intended to eliminate Republican representation," Paxton said. "But when Republicans respond in kind, Democrats rely on false accusations of racism to secure a partisan advantage."

Gov. Greg Abbott sharply criticized the court's ruling Tuesday, saying in a statement that Texas legislators "redrew our congressional maps to better reflect Texans' conservative voting preferences - and for no other reason."

"Any claim that these maps are discriminatory is absurd and unsupported by the testimony offered during ten days of hearings," he added. 

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The 2-1 ruling comes after a nearly two-week trial in El Paso, Texas, and requires lawmakers in the Lone Star State to revert to an earlier congressional map that the state legislature had adopted in 2021.

The new congressional map in Texas would have redrawn five districts in the state to be more favorable to Republicans. 

Senior Democratic Party officials, for their part, praised the ruling as a victory for the party - and for the Democrats in the state legislature, who broke quorum for two weeks earlier this year in a bid to stave off the bill's passage. 

"Texas Democrats and the DNC fought valiantly for fair representation, and now, with this decision, the court has ruled that Texas Republicans cannot implement this blatant gerrymander in the next election," DNC Chair Ken Martin said in a statement. 

The push from Trump allies is seen by many as an effort to avoid a repeat of the 2018 midterm elections, which saw Democrats retake the House majority. 

The party in power tends to lose more seats during midterm elections, as was the case with Democrats during the 2010 midterms, when Republicans wrested back a strong House majority. 

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"We must keep the majority at all costs," Trump said on Monday.

It is unclear if the Supreme Court would agree to take up the appeal from Texas, or to grant the emergency stay Paxton vowed to seek. 

But it comes at a time when the Supreme Court is actively weighing the states' use of race in the drawing of congressional maps. Justices heard a second round of oral arguments last month in Lousiana v. Callais, a case centered on that very issue. 

A majority of the court seemed poised to significantly weaken a key Voting Rights Act provision that prohibits states from diluting the power of minority voters, though the court has not yet issued a final ruling.