Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced Wednesday that the state legislature will prioritize redistricting during a special session later this year, a move with major implications for the 2026 midterm elections as Republicans seek to protect their narrow House majority.<\/p>\n
In a press release outlining several legislative priorities, Abbott emphasized that lawmakers will focus on crafting \u201clegislation that provides a revised congressional redistricting plan in light of constitutional concerns raised by the U.S. Department of Justice.\u201d<\/p>\n
The announcement follows a letter from the Trump administration\u2019s DOJ civil rights division, which expressed \u201cserious concerns\u201d about the legality of four Texas congressional districts. The DOJ labeled Districts TX-09, TX-18, TX-29, and TX-33 as unconstitutional \u201ccoalition districts\u201d and urged Texas to remove race-based considerations from these maps.<\/p>\n
The DOJ\u2019s letter referenced the 2023 Supreme Court ruling in Allen v. Milligan, which found Alabama had likely violated the Voting Rights Act by using racial gerrymandering. Justice Brett Kavanaugh\u2019s opinion stressed that race-based redistricting authority cannot extend indefinitely and must be temporary.<\/p>\n
Additionally, the letter cited Perry v. Galveston County, clarifying that \u201ccoalition districts\u201d do not receive protection under the Voting Rights Act unless the minority group is geographically compact enough to form a majority within a district. The DOJ concluded that Texas\u2019s current districts are \u201cvestiges of an unconstitutional racially based gerrymandering past\u201d and must be corrected. This development comes as Republicans also scored a win in Wisconsin, where the state Supreme Court rejected a Democrat-backed redistricting effort expected to favor Democrats in 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced Wednesday that the state legislature will prioritize redistricting during a special session later this year, a move with major implications for the… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8581,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n