The Trump gerrymandering tour has not been going well. So far, it has succeeded in Texas, where new districts could dislodge up to five Democrats, and Missouri, where lawmakers voted to muscle out Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO) by splitting up Kansas City. But Texas is under a legal challenge and, more importantly, still gives Democrats opportunities to hold onto at least two of the five seats, while the Missouri map could get challenged by referendum (surprisingly, without much help from national Democrats) and delayed into 2028.
Meanwhile, California’s Election Rigging Response Act, which would draw new maps to likely offset losses in Texas with gains for Democrats, looks like it will sail to an initiative victory on November 4. Utah was forced by a judge to redraw its Congressional maps, giving one or maybe two Democrats a chance to win there. So accounting for what’s actually in place today, the outcome of the redistricting wars could be Democrats +1 or maybe even more.
Several other states are considering map changes; the fight is not over. But we don’t really have to look to Indianapolis or Tallahassee or Topeka or Columbus or anywhere else to figure out who will gain an advantage. You just have to look to One First Street, NE in Washington, D.C., the home of the Supreme Court.
Related: Donald Trump Won’t Be Saved by Maps
Oral arguments were heard on Wednesday in a pair of consolidated cases from Louisiana (known by the primary case involved, Louisiana v. Callais) that will determine the future of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, really the only section that remains operative. The Court heard Callais last term, but took the unusual step of rehearing it at the beginning of their new session, and the way oral arguments trended on Wednesday, observers are fairly convinced that Section 2 will be severely damaged, if not dismantled, in a final ruling.
What that means is that states could draw racially discriminatory maps, robbing minority voters of the fair chance to elect representatives. In practical terms, it means that a host of “minority opportunity” districts in the South will be obliterated. According to an analysis from Fair Fight Action and Black Voters Matter, overturning Section 2 could result in a direct shift of 19 districts to Republicans.
That goes well beyond the smaller handful of seats that could change hands as Trump tries to intimidate state legislators into rigging maps. If it were only up to Trump, Republicans would get a minimal advantage next year. But it’s John Roberts’s Supreme Court that has the real power to put the country on the road to rotten boroughs and locked-in partisan dominance.
THE POTENTIAL SUPREME COURT RULING would recharge a gerrymandering scheme that was losing forward motion. Indiana has seen two vice-presidential visits and is still noncommittal toward what could be two Republican pickups. Florida, which once seemed to be moving forward, has now stalled. New Hampshire has pretty much ruled it out. Kansas wants a special legislative session, but now it’s primarily about an anti-transgender bill, not gerrymandering, and the fact that lawmakers have been invited to the White House for a “conference” suggests that there still isn’t the supermajority needed to override Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto for redistricting.
More districts will definitely be redrawn. Ohio must alter its maps for the midterms, and while Republicans have dragged their feet on unveiling changes, they appear to be targeting at least two and maybe three seats. State House Speaker Matt Huffman has said outright that “there is no requirement” for the maps to be fair. And Republicans in North Carolina, which is already pretty radically gerrymandered, have planned a vote that would target one seat held by Rep. Don Davis (D-NC) in the only swing district in the state.
On the Democratic side, Maryland is still considering a new map to knock out Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD), and Democrats even have a top recruit in the wings. And House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) is appealing to Illinois to redistrict, though lawmakers haven’t warmed to the idea.
The point is that, without the Supreme Court, you would see a minor shift in the balance of power that would not be enough to change the overall outcome of the election in a good Democratic year. But the potential ruling in Callais does have the potential to be determinative.
The case involves a map drawn by a court to include a second majority-Black district in Louisiana, which would align with the Black population percentage in the state (Louisiana is 33 percent Black and has six congressional districts). But when that map was submitted, a group of white voters sued, claiming that the maps to prevent racial discrimination and comply with the Voting Rights Act were themselves discriminatory, violating the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause and the 15th Amendment’s restrictions on basing the right to vote on race or color. (Seriously.)
A lower court supported and the Supreme Court agreed to hear this twisted appeal, which basically says that the 14th and 15th amendments can be wielded to stop the enforcement of civil rights. Louisiana Republicans at first wanted the Supreme Court to reverse the lower court, but then they saw the opportunity to redraw maps, and asked the Court to just throw out Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act altogether.
Just a couple of years ago, in Allen v. Milligan, the Court upheld Section 2 and allowed a new majority-Black district in Alabama to be drawn. But in Wednesday’s oral arguments, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who was the key swing vote in that case, repeatedly alluded to a “time limit” for the race-conscious provisions of Section 2. This is analogous to an argument that chipped away at Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act in Shelby County v. Holder, that you just can’t enforce discrimination on an open-ended basis. The idea that racism has an endpoint is fanciful, but the law at this point means what five justices on the Court say it means. If you can’t have a race-conscious remedy to anything, then you can’t really have civil rights laws.
The law at this point means what five justices on the Court say it means.
A ruling against Section 2 would directly target members of the Congressional Black and Congressional Hispanic Caucuses. If mapmakers don’t have to pay attention to race, they could take out two seats in Alabama, three in Florida, two in Georgia, two in Louisiana, one in Missouri, one in Mississippi, one in North Carolina, one in South Carolina, one in Tennessee, and up to five more in Texas. Up to 30 percent of the Congressional Black Caucus would be at risk, and 11 percent of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
Election law expert Rick Hasen responded to oral arguments by saying that Section 2 may not be struck down but just reinterpreted into oblivion. “The Supreme Court once again thwarts congressional intent and democratic processes,” Hasen wrote. “It will be an earthquake in the American political system, and I hope it leads to a new civil rights movement.”
In practical terms, whether this would matter for 2026 depends on when the Supreme Court issues the ruling. But the fact that they scheduled Callais so early in their term suggests that conservative justices understand the need for speed. The state legislatures brought into play are all in the south, and all are either fully in the hands of Republicans or with enough Republican control to get it done. (North Carolina has a Democratic governor, for example, but the governor is not involved in the redistricting process and cannot veto maps). The Republican legislators would be highly motivated to act quickly to get rid of Black and Hispanic members of Congress.
Conservative justices understand the need for speed.
For example, Louisiana backed out of changing Congressional lines in an upcoming special session because they didn’t think they’d get a ruling in time. But they are moving toward delaying their election schedule so they can strike immediately once a ruling comes down.
Whether states speed up for 2026 or play it out in future years, ending Section 2 restrictions on redistricting would cement Republican control of the House in ways that would be difficult to surmount.
Democrats did not move to restrict gerrymandering in federal legislation when they had opportunities. The Supreme Court punted on directly involving itself in partisan gerrymandering, but now seems to have found a way to bestow a huge advantage on the South’s white Republicans—and thereby, on Republicans nationally. The Court’s machinations matter more than Trump’s machinations, and they could be devastatingly successful.