What happened
A panel of federal judges in El Paso ruled 2-1 Tuesday that the new Texas congressional map drawn up at the behest of President Donald Trump was likely an illegal racial gerrymander. Texas Republicans engineered the map to add five GOP seats to their slim House majority, setting off a nationwide redistricting fight. The court ordered Texas to use its 2021 congressional map in next year’s midterm elections.
Who said what
Texas Republicans said publicly they were drawing the new districts for partisan reasons, as allowed by the Supreme Court, but “substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered the 2025 map,” U.S. District Judge Jeffrey V. Brown, a Trump appointee, said in his 160-page opinion. Gov. Greg Abbott (R) and the GOP-led state Legislature adopted “racial objectives” laid out by Justice Department civil rights chief Harmeet Dhillon in a “legally incorrect” July 7 letter that was “challenging to unpack” because it “contains so many factual, legal and typographical errors.”
The ruling was a “stinging setback” for Trump and Republicans, who initially had the “upper hand” in their “unusual” mid-decade gerrymander push, The Washington Post said. But “state-level backlash, Democrats’ big Election Day win for California’s redistricting measure and this court ruling have cut into that advantage,” Politico said. Trump now “stands to end the fight he began behind or near a draw,” leaving Republicans “wondering whether the nationwide remapping effort was worth the political capital.”
What next?
Abbot’s “quick appeal” of the ruling “will give the Supreme Court the last word on which maps the state uses,” The Wall Street Journal said. But the window for Texas congressional candidates to file closes Dec. 8.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Trump defends Saudi prince, shrugs off Khashoggi murderSpeed Read The president rebuked an ABC News reporter for asking Mohammed bin Salman about the death of a Washington Post journalist at the Saudi Consulate in 2018
-
Congress passes bill to force release of Epstein filesSpeed Read The Justice Department will release all files from its Jeffrey Epstein sex-trafficking investigation
-
Is Wicked: For Good defying expectations?Talking Point Second half of hit musical film adaptation hamstrung by source material, but Cynthia Erivo and Jeff Goldblum are ‘sublime’
-
Trump defends Saudi prince, shrugs off Khashoggi murder
Speed Read The president rebuked an ABC News reporter for asking Mohammed bin Salman about the death of a Washington Post journalist at the Saudi Consulate in 2018
-
Congress passes bill to force release of Epstein files
Speed Read The Justice Department will release all files from its Jeffrey Epstein sex-trafficking investigation
-
Trump says he will sell F-35 jets to Saudi ArabiaSpeed Read The president plans to make several deals with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman this week
-
Judge blasts ‘profound’ errors in Comey caseSpeed Read ‘Government misconduct’ may necessitate dismissing the charges against the former FBI director altogether
-
Ecuador rejects push to allow US military basesSpeed Read Voters rejected a repeal of a constitutional ban on US and other foreign military bases in the country
-
Trump pivots on Epstein vote amid GOP defectionsSpeed Read The president said House Republicans should vote on a forced release of the Justice Department’s Jeffrey Epstein files
-
Will California tax its billionaires?Talking Points A proposed one-time levy would shore up education and Medicaid
-
Trump DOJ sues to block California redistrictingSpeed Read California’s new congressional map was drawn by Democrats to flip Republican-held House seats
