Why the GOP Will Win the Gerrymandering War

Texas Democrats remain on the lam, having fled the Lone Star State to avoid a special session of the legislature called by Gov. Greg Abbott to deal with flood relief and redistricting.

By disregarding their legislative duties to deny the House a quorum, these Democrats have effectively abandoned the victims of the deadly July 4 Kerr County deluge and delayed a redistricting plan that would bring the state’s congressional map into compliance with a directive from the U.S. Justice Department to eliminate “coalition districts.”

The Democrats object to the plan because it will likely increase the number of Republicans in the Texas delegation to the U.S. House of Representatives. Fleeing the state is something of a tradition for Texas Democrats—who also fled the state in 1979, 2003, and 2021 to avoid votes on other legislation—but it invariably ends with their humiliating capitulation to the will of the majority.

Nonetheless, this saga has become a cause célèbre for the corporate media, which is covering it as if Texas invented partisan redistricting. The Washington Post, for example, ran a story under this headline: “Texas ignited a gerrymandering war. We will all pay the price.”

Likewise, a number of Democrat governors are using this issue to bolster their bona fides as defenders of “our democracy.” Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey, for example, hilariously threatened to redraw her state’s congressional map if Texas follows through with its plan. This will be difficult, however, because there are no Republicans in the Commonwealth’s House delegation.

The bluster from other Democrat governors is no less risible. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, who praised the fugitive Texas Democrats as “heroes,” has suggested that Illinois may redraw its district map if Gov. Abbott doesn’t relent. But Pritzker has credibility issues. In 2021, he broke a campaign pledge by approving one of the most gerrymandered maps in the nation. Even Stephen Colbert called him out on it: “Because all states, to a certain extent, do this, why is what Texas is doing particularly egregious?”

Pritzker’s hypocrisy is by no means unique among Democrat governors. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, for example, wrote the following sanctimonious passage in an editorial for the Houston Chronicle:

“At President Trump’s direction, Texas state House Republicans are attempting to redraw their congressional maps mid-decade, an aggressive power grab designed to flip as many as five current Democratic seats… What Texas is doing isn’t a clever strategy, it’s political arson—torching our democracy to cling to power. The only viable recourse is to fight fire with fire. This isn’t just a Texas issue. When Republicans rig congressional maps in one state, it weakens representation in every state.”

This nonsense is particularly disingenuous considering that Hochul has pledged to break more than a mere campaign promise if Texas Republicans go forward with their redistricting plan. As a New York Post headline puts it, “Hysterical Hochul vowing to flout law to redraw voting map.”

The Empire State’s constitution explicitly forbids partisan map-drawing, and it also stipulates that redistricting can only be done at the end of each decade. Moreover, this has already been attempted, only to have New York’s highest court (the New York State Court of Appeals) reject it in 2023 for violating the state constitution’s anti-gerrymandering provisions.

Hochul’s redistricting scam is a model of probity compared to California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s scheme to bypass the supposedly “nonpartisan” Citizens Redistricting Commission in order to gerrymander the Golden State’s congressional districts even further. He plans to call a special election whereby, as he phrases it, “We will go to the people of this state in a transparent way and ask them to consider the new circumstances.”

There are, of course, no “new circumstances” in California. Newsom is just using the Texas plan as a pretext to usurp power from his state’s redistricting commission. As Hoover Institution fellow Lanhee Chen makes clear in the Los Angeles Times:

“Newsom wants to prematurely redraw the lines and craft his own partisan gerrymander for the November 2026 midterm elections, wresting control of the process away from the [California Citizens Redistricting Commission] and giving it instead to the Democratic majority in the state Legislature. Last week, Newsom confirmed that he will call a special election to get voter approval for this end-run around the commission, but even dressed up with a vote, this is cynical politics, not democracy, at work.”

Despite the willingness of Govs. Newsom and Hochul to circumvent their state constitutions in order to expand their already bloated congressional delegations, it will be difficult to accomplish this in time to matter for the 2026 midterms. Even if a majority of California voters reverse their decision to have redistricting done by commission, there is likely to be considerable pushback—including protracted lawsuits. In New York, Hochul’s allies in the legislature want to amend the state constitution to allow lawmakers to draw new lines if Texas or another state engages in mid-decade redistricting, but that would go into effect in 2027.

Gov. Abbott has no such legal or procedural hurdles to overcome. Indeed, the Lone Star State’s constitution permits him to call an unlimited number of special legislative sessions. Moreover, he has confirmed that he will call “session after session” until the AWOL legislators return to their jobs.

Meanwhile, in Ohio, the state’s redistricting rules quite literally require its district map to be redrawn before next year’s midterms. According to a report in Signal Ohio, “Republicans hold 10 congressional districts while Democrats hold five. But three of Democrats’ seats are in districts that are competitive, thanks to the mix of voters who live in them.”

Thus, in Texas and Ohio alone, the GOP is positioned to capture up to eight more House seats. And there are serious discussions about mid-decade redistricting underway in Missouri, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Florida. In fact, according to a Politico report, “Republican state lawmakers nationwide oversee 55 Democratic congressional seats, and Democratic state majorities oversee just 35 held by the GOP.”

The Trump administration is planning to exploit that advantage everywhere possible. It is by no means a coincidence that Vice President JD Vance has been visiting Republican lawmakers in places like Indiana.

So, while virtually all of the legacy media coverage has been focused on Texas and the Democrat legislators who have gone AWOL, the Lone Star State is just one battle in a much larger redistricting war. The Republicans are better positioned to win the larger conflict because the Democrats have already gerrymandered all the juice out of their states and hamstrung themselves with ostensibly bipartisan redistricting commissions. This doesn’t guarantee victory for the GOP in the gerrymandering war, but the Republicans hold the commanding heights.

David Catron is a Senior Editor at the American Spectator. His writing has also appeared in PJ Media, the American Thinker, the Providence Journal, the Catholic Exchange and a variety of other publications.