The Texas Senate has given final approval to a new Republican-leaning congressional voting map, sending it to Governor Greg Abbott for his signature.
The state senate voted along party lines to pass the map 18-11 shortly after midnight on Saturday, following more than eight hours of heated debate.
President Donald Trump has pushed for the map to help the GOP maintain its slim majority in Congress in the 2026 midterm elections. It has five new districts that would favour Republicans.
Abbott, a Republican, is expected to quickly sign it into law, though Democrats have promised to challenge it in court.
The effort by Trump and Texas’s Republican-majority legislature prompted state Democrats to hold a two-week walkout and kicked off a wave of redistricting efforts across the country.
The weeks-long showdown has roiled the Texas Legislature. Much of the drama unfolded in the House, where the map ultimately passed on Wednesday.
The showdown has also inflamed a broader, state-by-state redistricting battle, with governors from both parties pledging to redraw congressional maps.
California Democrats approved legislation on Thursday calling for a special election in November for residents to vote on a redrawn congressional map designed to help Democrats win five more House seats next year. Governor Gavin Newsom quickly signed it.
California’s map needs voter approval because, unlike in Texas, a nonpartisan commission normally draws the map to avoid the sort of political battle that is playing out.
On Friday, Abbott called California’s redistricting “a joke” and asserted that Texas’s new map is constitutional but California’s would be overturned.
Trump wants more states to revise maps
On a national level, the partisan makeup of existing districts puts Democrats within three seats of a majority. The incumbent president’s party usually loses seats in the midterms.
The Texas redraw is already reshaping the 2026 race, with Democratic Representative Lloyd Doggett, the dean of the state’s congressional delegation, announcing on Thursday that he will not seek re-election to his Austin-based seat if the new map takes effect.
Under the proposed map, Doggett’s district would overlap with that of another Democratic incumbent, Republican Greg Casar.
Trump has pushed other Republican-controlled states, including Indiana and Missouri, to also revise their maps to add more winnable GOP seats.
Ohio Republicans were also already scheduled to revise their maps to make them more partisan.
Redistricting typically occurs once a decade, immediately after a census. While some states have their own limitations, there is no national impediment to a state trying to redraw districts in the middle of the decade.
The US Supreme Court has said the Constitution does not outlaw partisan gerrymandering, only using race to redraw district lines.
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