Latest news with #Redistricting
Washington Post
8 hours ago
- Politics
- Washington Post
Putin and Trump go face-to-face
Good morning, Early Birds. Send tips to earlytips@ Thanks for waking up with us. In today's edition … Putin and Trump meet face-to-face for the first time since Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine ... California unveils its redistricting maps today … but first …
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Redistricting in Texas is complex, here is what to know about congressional maps
Texas is currently the battleground over U.S. Congressional districts that could affect the 2026 midterm elections. Gov. Greg Abbott announced the intention to redraw the congressional maps as part of the special session that affects representation for communities across the state. Abbott's announcement to redraw the congressional maps followed a request from President Donald Trump to find him five seats. The current proposals affect communities that were represented by Democrats, including the district represented by U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso. "The president said that he needed five seats because what we expect to be a very close mid-term election and give the partisan divide," Michael O. Adams, a political science professor at South Texas University, said. "The president wants to maintain Republican control." Dozens of Texas House Democrats fled the state to deny Abbott and Republicans a quorum to vote on the changes to the map. Attorney General Ken Paxton issued arrest warrants for Democrats in an attempt to bring them back to the state. Here is what you need to know about redistricting in Texas and across the United States: More: El Paso's Fort Bliss to become largest immigration detention facility in US What are congressional districts and what is redistricting? The representation of people is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, which states that a census must be held every 10 years to guarantee that the people of a region are represented in Congress. The redrawing of the congressional map usually follows the census to guarantee that each of the 435 Congressional districts represents an area in which there are 800,000 people. Redistricting denotes who represents an area in Congress, the state Legislature, as well as in local governments, including city councils, county commissioners courts and school boards. The idea is to have equal representation. "You can't have one member of Congress representing 400,000 people and the other members of Congress representing 800,000, because the person who is representing 400,000, their vote will be twice the impact of the others," Adams said. More: US Rep. Escobar, House Democrats sue Trump administration over ICE facility visits Redistricting rarely occurs between censuses, as is happening in Texas right now. The Texan congressional map was redrawn in 2021, following the 2020 census. The current efforts to redraw the Texas congressional districts are meant to give Republicans more seats. Has quorum been broken in Texas before? The Texas House of Representatives requires that 100 of the 151 members be present for the vote. Quorum has been broken in Texas on at least five occasions. The last time was when the map was redrawn mid-decade in 2003. The redistricting in 2003 gave Republicans more seats in Congress despite protests by Democrats. Quorum in the Texas House of Representatives was also broken in 1870, 1979, 2003 and 2021. More: FEMA offers states millions for ICE detention facilities, using money meant to help migrants What is Gerrymandering? Gerrymandering is the purposeful drawing of any political districts or legislative districts to give an advantage to any political party or any racial group. The term was coined in 1812 and is named for Elbridge Gerry, the former governor of Massachusetts, who signed a bill that redrew the state's senate election district on behalf of the Democratic-Republican party. The new district resembled the shape of a salamander. How has the Supreme Court affected redistricting? The 1965 Voting Rights Act looked to protect the rights of minority voters. But over the last six decades, the protections built into the act were slowly chipped away. The Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that federal courts could not rein in the power of state legislators to redraw maps in their favor. The court voted five to four to maintain partisan gerrymandering, with Chief Justice John Roberts stating that federal courts did not have the authority to intervene. More: Fort Bliss once housed refugees, now set for largest ICE deportation center Another Supreme Court ruling in 2013 gutted the provision of the Voting Rights Act that required states with histories of racial discrimination to obtain approval from the federal government before changing state voting laws, including the establishment of new district maps. The result of these rollbacks of the Voting Rights Act has contributed to the weakening of minority political influence. Adams points to how the current push to redraw the congressional district maps will limit the political influence of Latino and Black communities. 'What we're witnessing in this redistricting cycle is a masterclass in demographic manipulation where growth among Latino and Black populations in Houston is not translating into proportional political power," Adams said. "It's a modern example of retrogression: packing, cracking, carefully diluting emerging coalitions of color.' Jeff Abbott covers the border for the El Paso Times and can be reached at:jdabbott@ @palabrasdeabajo on Twitter or @ on Bluesky. This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: Texas redistricting 2025: What new congressional maps mean for voters
CBS News
6 days ago
- Politics
- CBS News
Rainbow PUSH Coalition hosts Texas Democrats protesting Republican redistricting effort
The Rainbow PUSH Coalition is standing with Texas Democratic lawmakers who fled their state to halt a redistricting vote. They spoke in Chicago on Saturday at a forum they dubbed, "Voting Rights in Peril," focusing on the federal Voting Rights Act, 60 years after it went into effect. Texas Republicans want to redraw their state's congressional map ahead of the 2026 elections to potentially add five GOP congressional seats and help the party maintain a slim majority in the U.S. House of Representatives. Democrats say the plan amounts to racial gerrymandering. "They have found where the Black people are and the Brown people are, and they have divided us. They have cracked us and they have packed us into districts to dilute our voting strength, which effectively denies Black and Brown people the right to elect a representative of their choice," said Texas state Rep. Jolanda Jones. Texas Republicans have taken retaliatory measures against the Democrats who fled the state to deny Republicans the quorum needed to vote on their redistricting plan – issuing fines and civil arrest warrants, and threatening to cut office budgets. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott also has filed a lawsuit seeking to remove one of the state's House Democratic leaders, Rep. Gene Wu, form office, calling him "the ringleader" of the Democratic effort to block a redistricting vote.
Fox News
6 days ago
- Politics
- Fox News
Networks pounce on Republican redistricting. They didn't care when Democrats did it
Redistricting is an issue for political junkies. Your average American doesn't obsess over district maps, even when they help determine who's in the majority. They passed a redistricting plan out of committee in Texas on August 2, prompting Texas Democrats to flee to Illinois and other blue states to deny a legislative quorum. Parker Thayer of the Capital Research Center tickled me by tweeting: "Going to Illinois to protest gerrymandering is like going to Wisconsin to protest cheese." Redistricting in blue states is never national "news," because maximizing Democrat seats is considered wonderfully just and humane. These networks aren't referees or moderators or reformers who just want sensible districting in the public interest. They are a partisan adjunct that only consider gerrymandering outrageous when Republicans are accused of doing it. On November 23, 2021 – the Tuesday before Thanksgiving that year – Democrat Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed off on a redistricting map for Illinois that shamelessly gerrymandered out Republicans, especially poor Adam Kinzinger, who was busily doing Nancy Pelosi's bidding on the stilted January 6 committee. ABC, CBS and NBC aired nothing. Only the "PBS News" Hour touched it briefly. Their guest Dave Wasserman of the Cook Political Report was blunt: "This is a pretty aggressive Democratic gerrymander ... it just goes to show the lengths to which parties go to, to try and entrench their advantage." Texas Democrats also traveled this week to New York, where Democrat Gov. Kathy Hochul claimed "this is a war! We are at war." She's not at war with criminals or terrorists. She's at war with Republicans. She promised to redistrict New York. But wait – Hochul signed a gerrymandered map just last year – on February 28, 2024. Network coverage last year? Zero. Zippy. On ABC's George Stephanopoulos show on Sunday, there was panic over Texas. Former Obama Attorney General Eric Holder warned "Our democracy is really threatened by what the Republicans are proposing to do in Texas right now." Stephanopoulos could only ask: "Is there any way to stop it?" Democrats claim that democracy is strong or weak depending on whether they're in power or not. When they lose, democracy is dying. All three networks leaped on the Texas story on Monday morning. "CBS Mornings" queen Gayle King used the D-word: "Texas Democrats flee to Illinois over what they call a power grab by Republicans, a fight with huge implications for Congress and democracy. ... It's a showdown that could have a big impact on democracy in this country." ABC's Jonathan Karl was the only one to note this isn't just a Republican tactic: "Democrats have played the game, too, in the states they control. In deep-blue California, for example, 38% voted Republican last year, and out of 52 congressional districts, only nine are held by Republicans." On NBC's "Today," co-host Craig Melvin announced: "Our top story on this Monday morning, that growing showdown in Texas over a controversial redistricting plan." The networks decide what is "controversial" and what is not. Anything they don't like is "controversial." Everything they like is just fine, as fine as former President Joe Biden's mental state. At least Melvin asked reporter Ryan Chandler: "How much of this is just a stunt? "Or is there some indication that this move could actually work by Democrats?" Chandler said it's only temporary, it won't last. On Monday August 4, Chandler led off by touting warnings from Democrat Governors Kathy Hochul and Gavin Newsom that they too would pursue new congressional maps to further skew toward their party … leaving out the fact that they've already tried to gerrymander to the max. On "CBS Evening News," reporter Ed O'Keefe noted what Democrats have done: "If you look here in Illinois, they have drawn their map in such a way that Republicans barely have any seats." Bizarrely, the toughest broadcast pushback on Pritzker came from CBS comedian Stephen Colbert, who held up a map of Illinois's congressional map and told Pritzker, "If you're considering doing a little more redrawing in Illinois, you already have some crazy districts in Illinois." "PBS News Hour" is still drawing on taxpayer money as it promotes the Democrat party line, especially the part about how it's "disenfranchising" minorities. On Monday, PBS's Stephanie Sy relayed: "Besides what Democrats see as a brazen power grab, the new map could disproportionately disenfranchise Black and Latino voters." At least Melvin asked reporter Ryan Chandler: "How much of this is just a stunt? Or is there some indication that this move could actually work by Democrats?" Chandler said it's only temporary, it won't last. On August 5, PBS anchor Geoff Bennett repeated it: "Some of the Democrats are in Illinois. They said today that the redrawn map would disenfranchise voters of color and that they're not backing down." By this definition, if you're Black and you don't get to vote for Texas Democrat Rep. Jasmine Crockett, your voting rights are denied. It's explicitly racial: if Blacks don't get to vote for a Black Democrat, we're back in Jim Crow times. Polls show the Democrats are a mess. The socialist Bernie bros (and gals) hate the party establishment, because it's never woke enough. It's not destroying capitalism and police departments fast enough. It's not resisting deportations enough. It's not supporting Islamists against Israel enough. Now they're in danger of not gerrymandering enough. But you can't win a majority if your polls are in the toilet.
Yahoo
7 days ago
- Politics
- Yahoo
Historic Loss of Congressional Seats Looms Amidst California Redistricting Clash
Historic Loss of Congressional Seats Looms Amidst California Redistricting Clash originally appeared on L.A. Mag. In the mid-20th century, California emerged as a cornerstone of Democratic Party political power. Each decade brought a population boom, and with it, a growing voice in Washington. Between 1950 and 1990, the state gained an average of six new seats in the U.S. House of Representatives per apportionment cycle, largely due to a wave of migration, economic growth and national now, that era is ending. According to new projections, the state could lose as many as four seats in the 2030 apportionment — a stunning reversal that would mark the largest single-decade loss in its latest data from the Brennan Center for Justice, the National Democratic Redistricting Committee (NDRC), and the American Redistricting Project all forecast a significant decline in California's representation. At the same time, red states like Texas and Florida are poised to gain up to four seats each — a shift that could bolster Republican power in Congress and further weaken California's influence in federal the heart of California's historic slowdown is a substantial shift in demographics. High housing costs, pandemic-era shifts to remote work and the outmigration of working families and retirees have contributed to a population drop of more than 412,000 people between 2020 and 2023. This decline has significant political consequences. Analysis by the San Francisco Chronicle shows that California's Democratic strongholds are shrinking fastest. From 2020 to 2023, California districts that leaned more than 20 points to the left of the national average lost the most residents, while Republican-leaning districts gained California's political clout shrinks, Governor Gavin Newsom is escalating a partisan standoff with Texas, where state Republicans are already attempting to redraw congressional maps. Texas Governor Greg Abbott called a special session to approve new, more favorable GOP in response, floated a bold countermove:'Two can play that game,' Newsom wrote on X, indicating that he may try to redraw California's maps to benefit Democrats, despite the state's laws against partisan gerrymandering. Newsom's idea has split Democrats. Some strategists argue that redistricting is now a tool for political survival — a necessary counter to GOP tactics. Others are warning of legal and moral concerns."[By] legitimizing the race to the bottom of gerrymandering, Democrats will ultimately lose," said Assemblymember Alex Lee, the head of the California Legislature's Progressive Caucus, to redistricting authority currently rests with an independent citizen commission, created by voters through a 2010 ballot measure. Upending that structure would likely require a constitutional amendment, and could trigger legal challenges — especially if the effort is seen as a power grab, rather than a policy some experts argue that Newsom has little to lose."Maps that are really pretty good for Dems are still in place," said redistricting expert Paul Mitchell to the Sacramento Bee. "There's no downside to trying."But if California does lose four seats, the pressure will mount on Democrats to decide whether to double down on fair maps and risk falling behind, or to embrace the political hardball they've long criticized. Either way, the outcome could reshape the national balance of power for years to come. This story was originally reported by L.A. Mag on Jul 22, 2025, where it first appeared.
