While Texas Republicans threaten elected state Democrats with arrest for trying to resist President Trump’s power grab via their state’s congressional maps, the Trump administration is trying to plant some mid-decade gerrymandering seeds in Indiana, too.
If you’ve not been following the situation that has entirely boiled over in Texas this week, here’s a very simple recap: The Trump administration wants Texas to redraw its congressional maps for at least five seats that are currently held by Democrats in the U.S. House. Trump wants this because Republicans barely hold a majority in the House as it is, and the administration is worried about the House flipping to Democrats in the 2026 midterms, which would allow the lower chamber to launch a wave of investigations into the administration’s wrongdoing. Democrats would have to pick up just three seats in the House to take back the majority.
Republicans in Texas have taken on that task with growing enthusiasm. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called the state legislature back for a special session in order to hold a vote on the redrawn maps, which would heavily favor Republicans. Texas Democrats fled the state over the weekend — to blue states such as Illinois and New York — to deny their Republican colleagues a quorum and are currently planning to delay any vote on new maps indefinitely. Both Abbott and Texas AG Ken Paxton are threatening to use the courts to vacate the 56 Dems’ seats in the House and the Republican state House speaker has issued warrants for their arrests. Abbott is claiming the Dems could be charged with felony bribery and U.S. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) is asking the FBI to assist in arresting the Texas Democrats. That’s the gist. (For more on the story so far, you can catch up with our live coverage of the situation here.)
The once-unprecedented practice of mid-decade redistricting is what the Trump administration is using to try to maintain its Republican trifecta in Washington. Its tiny majority in the House is not just its main point of vulnerability, but the slim margins for passing legislation have made it more difficult for Trump to ram all his legislative initiatives through Congress without pushback. On some level, the tactic is revealing, speaking to Republicans’ high degree of concern about holding the House in the upcoming midterms. And what the Trump administration is now doing in Indiana serves as another datapoint for that argument.
Tomorrow, Trump is sending Vice President JD Vance to Indiana to meet with the Republican governor and legislative leaders there about possibly redistricting the state’s congressional districts. Per reporting from the Indy Star:
Vance plans to meet with Braun, House Speaker Todd Huston of Fishers and Senate Pro Tempore Rodric Bray of Martinsville. The group expects to discuss several topics, Braun said, but any discussion about redistricting would be “exploratory” and no commitments have been made at this point.
But Braun didn’t rule out calling a special session to redraw the Hoosier State’s congressional districts in an attempt to squeeze in another Republican seat ahead of the 2026 midterms.
The bizarre thing is, Republicans already hold seven of Indiana’s nine seats in the House of Representatives. As one Indiana Democrat, state Rep. Matt Pierce, told the Indy Star, Vance’s visit is a pretty clear indicator that the White House is concerned about Trump’s “sinking” approval among voters.
“President Trump and Vice President Vance are so desperate they’re scraping for every seat they can get through gerrymandering,” Pierce said. “You have to be pretty desperate to decide having seven of the nine seats in Indiana held by Republicans is not enough.”
As it where, Democrats in Indiana do not have the same leverage as Texas Dems to resist any effort to redraw maps for either of the two seats held by Democrats: Democrats have a “superminority” in both chambers.
It’s Desperate — But They Could Get Away With It
To combat the effort to gerrymander maps in favor of Republicans in Texas, Democratic officials in blue states are looking into what options they might have for engaging in the same conduct, to try to offset any gains Republicans might be able to accumulate with their mid-decade ratfuckery.
The issue is, many blue states have rules in place to prevent the kind of partisan gerrymandering that Texas is currently engaged in. New York and California, for example, each have independent redistricting commissions, which are bipartisan panels that draw up fair congressional maps for the state legislature to approve.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom has a plan to try to get around the independent commission’s work to draw new maps if Texas Republicans are successful in their efforts. NBC News has more here.
Unrelated But LOL
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) has taken it upon herself to try to get ousted, disgraced former congressman George Santos (R-NY) out of jail. Earlier this week, she reportedly asked President Trump to grant clemency to Santos, who reported to prison for his seven year sentence in July. Per Politico:
Greene, a close Trump ally and conservative firebrand, said she sent a letter to the Department of Justice asking them to present a case to Trump for clemency consideration for the former New York member of Congress.
In Case You Missed It
Lots of good stuff published at TPM today:
We Need to Talk About Why Trump Judicial Nominees Won’t Talk About Obergefell
Congressional Watchdog Publishes Aptly Timed Reminder That WH Budget-Slashing Scheme is Illegal
In Firing the BLS Chief, Trump Escalates His Administration’s War on Data
There’s a Big Sea Change Underway Among Even the Most Conventional Dems
Yesterday’s Most Read Story
‘Successful Businessman’ Trump Mobilizes Business Economists Against Him
What We Are Reading
Wall Street Sees Decline in Dealmaking for Oil and Gas Clients
Home Depot and Lowe’s Share Data From Hundreds of AI Cameras With Cops
OT:
Of course a convicted sex criminal would say she didn’t see anything. It was normal in her eyes.
This is a warning. Stop shopping at Home Depot and Lowes. they need to lose customers.
Does anybody read the Constitution anymore??
Isn’t the original in cursive? No one reads cursive these days…
On the bright side - Republicans appear to be preparing for an election and not just saying - we good.
Mid-census redistricting: More proof that the only way Republicans can win is by cheating. We ought to be calling this out. Every Democrat needs to be expressing outrage. The comedians should be honing their routines. And yes – even the sorry infotainment media that we have, instead of news, should call out the blatant attempts to unbalance the scales by cheating.
Speak up!