Abbott signs GOP’s redrawn Texas map
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) signed into law a new House map on Friday that’s expected to give Republicans five additional pickup opportunities ahead of 2026, delivering the GOP a major win before the midterms while opponents challenge it in court.
“This is Gov. Greg Abbott. I’m about to sign the law that creates the one big, beautiful map that ensures fairer representation in the United States Congress for Texas,” Abbott said in a video posted on social media, thanking several lawmakers and politicians for their work on the map.
“Texas is now more red in the United States Congress,” he added after signing the map.
The state Senate passed the new congressional lines in the early morning hours over the weekend, as Democrats sought to delay its inevitable passage. Texas state Sen. Carol Alvarado (D) planned to hold an hours-long filibuster when the upper chamber convened just after midnight last Saturday, though Republicans quickly nixed the effort.
The new House map delivers a victory for Republicans, offering them a handful of seats they could gain ahead of 2026 — allowing them to grow their delegation to up to 30 members instead of the current 25 serving in the House now — as the president’s party braces for the traditional headwinds associated with midterm environments.
Texas Democratic Party Chair Kendall Scudder slammed the maps in a statement, vowing that the party would challenge them.
“This isn’t over— we’ll see these clowns in court,” Scudder said. “We aren’t done fighting against these racially discriminatory maps, and fully expect the letter of the law to prevail over these sycophantic Republican politicians who think the rules don’t apply to them.”
The congressional lines are the product of a lobbying effort by President Trump and the White House as national Republicans sought to have Texas do an unusual mid-decade redistricting.
Texas Democrats blocked the GOP from passing the new congressional lines during their first 30-day special session, fleeing the state to deny Republicans a quorum, or the minimum number of lawmakers needed present in order to return to the state.
Democrats used that time to travel to blue states like California, Illinois, New York and Massachusetts to raise awareness about Texas’s redistricting plans. California is the only state so far that’s poised to potentially counter the Lone Star State’s expected gains, when the state passed a new House map that looks to neutralize Texas’s new congressional lines., teeing it up to come before voters in November.
Other Democratic governors have signaled that they are exploring their options, meaning other blue states could also take efforts to follow suit.
Meanwhile, the White House has been lobbying Indiana and Missouri to do mid-decade redistricting to add additional seats for their party. Florida, too, could redraw its lines.
Texas Democrats returned to their state during the second special session, once the first special session ended and their California counterparts introduced their new House map aimed at counteracting the one that passed in Texas. The passage of Texas’s map was inevitable given Republicans’ majorities in the state legislature along with a Republican governor.
Several groups already challenged the new Texas House map before Abbott signed it into law, arguing that it’s unconstitutional and violates the Voting Rights Act. A federal court has already scheduled dates for a preliminary injunction hearing, running from Oct. 1-10, in one of the lawsuits.
The lawsuits raise questions around whether litigation at the federal level will be successful given the U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative majority — though the high court has previously struck down Alabama’s congressional lines over a likely violation of the Voting Rights Act.
The broader redistricting battle that’s played out in response to Texas has been heated, with both parties lobbing attacks at the other. Democrats called Texas Republicans’ move a power grab while Republicans slammed their countermeasures as hypocritical after Dems traveled to several blue states where governors have tried to gerrymander the maps.
The House is seen as Democrats’ best chance at flipping at least one of the chambers in Congress next cycle, while Republicans are seeking to avoid delivering Trump and their party a divided government during the last two years of the president’s second term.
Updated at 12:28 p.m. EDT.