AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Friday signed into law a new congressional voting map designed to help Republicans gain more seats in the 2026 midterm elections, delivering a win for President Donald Trump and his desire to hold onto a slim GOP majority in the U.S. House.
The Texas map drafted in rare mid-decade redistricting prompted fierce protests from Democrats and sparked a gerrymandering tug-of-war for voters in states across the country.
“Texas is now more red in the United States Congress,” Abbott said in a video he posted on X of him signing the legislation.
Before Texas lawmakers passed their new map, California passed a bill asking voters to approve new Democratic-leaning districts to counter any Republican gains in Texas.
The incumbent president’s party usually loses congressional seats in the midterm election. On a national level, the partisan makeup of existing districts puts Democrats within three seats of a majority.
Texas Democrats have vowed to challenge the new map in court. They delayed a vote by two weeks by leaving Texas on Aug. 3 in protest and to rally support nationally. Upon their return, they were assigned round-the-clock police monitoring to ensure they showed up for debate.
But the large Republican majority in the Texas Legislature made its ultimate passage all but inevitable.
The head of Texas' Democratic Party criticized Abbott, saying he and Republicans “effectively surrendered Texas to Washington” with the new map.
“They love to boast about how ‘Texas Tough’ they are, but when Donald Trump made one call, they bent over backwards to prioritize his politics over Texans,” state Democratic Party Chairman Kendall Scudder said in a statement. “Honestly, it’s pathetic.”
Because the Supreme Court has blessed purely partisan gerrymandering, the only way opponents can stop the new Texas map would be by arguing in court that it violates the Voting Rights Act requirement to keep minority communities together so they can select representatives of their choice.
Republican leaders have denied the map is racially discriminatory and contend the new map creates more new majority-minority seats than the previous one. They have also been explicit in their desire to draw a new map for a goal of electing more Republicans.
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This version corrects when Democrats left Texas to Aug. 3 instead of July.
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