A key court test begins for Texas' redrawn US House map that boosts the
GOP
[October 02, 2025]
By JOHN HANNA
A panel of federal judges began considering Wednesday whether Texas can
use a redrawn congressional map that boosts Republicans and launched an
expanding redistricting battle ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.
The case in an El Paso courtroom is the first test of Texas' new map.
Republican state lawmakers quickly redrew the lines this summer to give
the GOP five more seats at the urging of President Donald Trump in an
effort to preserve the slim Republican U.S. House majority.
Civil rights groups and dozens of Black and Hispanic voters are
challenging the changes, saying the new map intentionally reduces
minority voters' influence. They argue that the new district lines
represent racial gerrymandering prohibited by the landmark 1965 Voting
Rights Act and the U.S. Constitution.
Texas Republican lawmakers and state leaders deny these claims, saying
the map is a legal partisan gerrymander.
The hearing is expected to last more than a week. It is unclear how
quickly the judges will issue a ruling.
The new map eliminated five of the state's nine “coalition” districts,
where no minority group has a majority but together they outnumber
non-Hispanic white voters.
“Race and party have folded onto each other,” said Keith Gaddie, a Texas
Christian University political science professor who has testified as an
expert witness in redistricting cases over the past 25 years. “What
could be seen as being racial gerrymandering could just be partisan
gerrymandering."
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that the U.S. Constitution does not
prohibit partisan gerrymandering.
Texas says critics cloak partisan fears in rhetoric about race
The new Texas map is designed to give Republicans 30 of the state's 38
House seats, up from 25 now.
The state’s attorneys argue that Texas officials’ persistent statements
about their partisan motives show they weren’t engaged in illegal racial
gerrymandering but were in a “political arms-race,” Texas Attorney
General Ken Paxton’s office said in a recent court filing.
The move in Texas has subsequently led some other states —
Republican-led as well as those led by Democrats — to respond with some
redistricting plans of their own in a scramble to try to dominate the
midterm elections.
California countered by putting a proposed map on the ballot in November
to pick up five Democratic seats. Missouri redrew its lines last month
to give the GOP an extra seat.
In court filings, Paxton's office argued that Republicans are offsetting
past Democratic gerrymanders, and the Texas map’s critics “seek to use
race as a foil to kneecap Texas’s efforts to even the playing field.”
“Whenever they do not get what they want, they cry racism,” its filing
said.
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Texas state Sen. Sarah Eckhardt, D-Austin, right, listens as Sen.
Phil King, R-Weatherford, speaks in favor of a bill before a vote on
a redrawn U.S. congressional map during a special session in the
Senate Chamber at the Texas Capitol in Austin, Texas, Aug. 22, 2025.
(AP Photo/Eric Gay, File)
Making a case involves detailed election analysis
The case will be heard by a panel of three judges, one each
appointed by Trump, and Presidents Barack Obama and Ronald Reagan.
Attorneys for groups and voters challenging the map aim to show that
a trial is likely to prove the new lines deny minority voters
opportunities to elect candidates of their choosing.
“States have to follow rules when they redistrict,” said Nina
Perales, an attorney representing some the voters and groups,
including the League of United Latin American Citizens. “They
provide essentially the buffer guards to protect the democratic
process.”
The judges are likely to hear a detailed analysis of voting
patterns.
“The minority community has to be what’s called politically
cohesive, which tends to mean that members of that community
overwhelmingly tend to prefer the same candidates in elections,”
said Richard Pildes, a constitutional law professor at New York
University.
Critics see new, ‘sham’ minority districts
The new map decreased the total number of congressional districts in
which minorities comprise a majority of voting-age citizens from 16
to 14.
Republicans argue the map is better for minority voters. While five
“coalition” districts are eliminated, there's a new, eighth
Hispanic-majority district, and two new Black-majority districts.
Critics consider each of those new districts a “sham,” arguing that
the majority is so slim that white voters, who tend to turn out in
larger percentages, will control election results.
“There is growing animus against African-American and other
communities who have historically been disenfranchised,” said
Derrick Johnson, the NAACP’s national president. “This is consistent
with the current climate and culture germinating from the White
House."
Critics also argued that the 2021 map itself didn't have enough
minority districts. For example, Perales said, Houston has enough
Hispanic voters for two such districts, and the new map has one.
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