A Republican-led committee of the Texas House voted on Saturday to advance a new congressional map drawn to flip five Democratic House districts in favor of Republican candidates, setting up a showdown over redistricting next week.
The vote came after a marathon 15-hour hearing on Friday in which the committee heard public testimony, almost all of it firmly against the aggressive changes that affect districts in Houston, Dallas and Austin, and along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Several Democratic members of Congress came to Austin to testify, arguing that the proposed map would diminish the power of Black and Hispanic communities across Texas and violate the federal Voting Rights Act. Al Green, a congressman from Houston, said the map was “racist.” Jasmine Crockett, a congresswoman from Dallas, vowed to immediately challenge it in court.
But in the end, the Republicans on the committee voted to deliver the map that had been called for by President Trump, who said last month that he hoped to get five more Republicans in the House. Republicans currently hold 25 of Texas’s 38 congressional seats.
Todd Hunter, a Republican state representative of Corpus Christi who sponsored the legislation for the map, said the new lines had been drawn “for partisan purposes,” not based on race, and that the resulting map was “completely transparent, and it’s lawful.”
The map now must be considered in a committee on calendars, which was set to meet on Sunday. A first vote by the full Texas House could come as early as Monday or Tuesday.
The State Senate must also approve the new map, or propose its own. Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, has indicated support for redistricting, though he has not commented on the new map, which he can sign into law or veto.
Texas Democrats could prevent the House from approving the map by failing to show up, denying the quorum needed for any legislative action.
But doing so comes with political and practical risks: Republican leaders in the Texas House fast-tracked the redistricting legislation before introducing any bills responding to the deadly floods in the Texas Hill Country — putting Democrats in the position of potentially walking out on legislation that addresses needs caused by the flooding.
And the Texas House adopted rules that call for fines of $500 per day for any member who is absent with out approval, a measure adopted after Democratic members broke quorum during a 2021 legislative fight over voting and redistricting.
Nationally, Republicans have looked at redistricting in Texas — and potentially in other states where the party has control of the government, such as Missouri and Indiana — as a means to preserve a slim Republican majority in the U.S. House after next year’s midterm elections, which have historically gone against the party holding the presidency.
In response, Democratic leaders in California, Illinois and New York have said they were considering redrawing their states’ maps to create additional seats for Democrats to win, and offset any Republican gains in Texas. Last month, Democratic members of the Texas House traveled to California and Illinois to meet with Gov. Gavin Newsom and Gov. JB Pritzker and discuss those possibilities.
J. David Goodman is the Houston bureau chief for The Times, reporting on Texas and Oklahoma.
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