In a dramatic turn, Justice Samuel Alito of the U.S. Supreme Court has temporarily reinstated Texas’s newly redrawn congressional map — a map that heavily favors Republicans — while the full Court considers whether a lower court was correct to block it. The suspended map was struck down by a three-judge panel, which found strong evidence that Texas’s redistricting relied on unconstitutional racial considerations. Alito’s order enables Texas officials to move forward with preparations for its 2026 primary elections under the GOP-supported boundaries, pending a final decision from the high court.
The stakes are high: the new map could give Texas Republicans up to five additional House seats in the 2026 midterm elections. Texas made an emergency appeal to reinstate this map, arguing that campaigns were already underway and that reverting to older district lines so close to filing deadlines — which is December 8 for Texas candidates — would cause chaos.
On the other side, Judge Jeffrey V. Brown, who wrote the ruling blocking the new map, strongly rejected the idea that the disruption of switching back was worth the political relief. In his 160-page opinion, he concluded that race — not just political strategy — played a predominant role in drawing the new district lines. Brown pointed to a July letter from the U.S. Department of Justice’s civil rights division, under the Trump administration, which warned Texas that several “coalition districts” (where no one racial group is in the majority) were constitutionally problematic.
Governor Greg Abbott and other Texas Republicans sharply contested Brown’s conclusions. They argue that the redistricting was motivated solely by partisan goals — to better align representation with conservative voters — not by race. Abbott said that framing the redistricting as racially discriminatory is “absurd,” emphasizing their intent to reflect changing political preferences in Texas. Meanwhile, Texas’s legal team told the Supreme Court that the federal judges’ injunction undermines election stability and risks undermining the integrity of the upcoming primary process.
The panel majority, however, was unmoved by the state’s defense. Judge Brown described how legislators used racial thresholds — for example, building districts around just-over-50% Black or Hispanic citizen voting-age populations — in ways that triggered strict scrutiny under constitutional law. He argued that partisanship alone could not justify the map’s design, particularly when the racial data appeared to guide how the districts were drawn. In his view, the lower court’s duty to avoid disrupting elections so close to a vote (the so-called Purcell principle) did not outweigh the risk of subjecting Texans to what he deemed a racially discriminatory map.
Now, with Justice Alito’s emergency order, the 2025 map goes back into effect — at least temporarily. Alito, who handles emergency matters from the 5th Circuit (which includes Texas), set a tight deadline for challengers to respond, signaling the urgency of the matter. Texas has asked the Supreme Court to hear the case in full, but a full oral argument is unlikely to happen before the March 2026 primaries. For now, Alito’s order is likely to determine the map that candidates and voters use next year, though the Court’s eventual ruling will decide the map’s long-term future.
