The Democratic Party’s group that works on state legislative races on Monday called on Democratic-led legislatures across the country to begin their own redistricting efforts, a step that could escalate a national battle after Republican efforts to redraw the congressional maps in Texas.
“The D.L.C.C. isn’t going to sit back and allow Republicans to cheat the system to keep themselves in power,” Heather Williams, the president of the group, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, said in a statement. “All options must be on the table — including Democratic state legislatures using their power to fight back and pursue redistricting mid-cycle in order to protect our democracy.”
Democrats have been stepping up their efforts to counter Republicans’ moves in Texas. On Sunday, Democrats in the Texas Legislature fled the state in order to break quorum and prevent Republicans from forcing through the maps this week.
While the D.L.C.C. was the first arm of the national party to make such an explicit call for new maps, officials at the Democratic National Committee indicated their support.
“Democrats everywhere should be ready to fight fire with fire to combat Trump and Republicans’ craven scheme to rig the maps in their favor,” Ken Martin, the chairman of the D.N.C., said in a statement. “But to end these desperate Republican schemes for good, Democrats need to win more elections up and down the ballot, especially at the state level.”
Republicans, including President Trump, have also been clear that they may look beyond Texas to other states, including Missouri, New Hampshire and Florida, to redraw more maps to benefit their party before the 2026 midterms. Congressional maps are ordinarily redrawn once a decade after the federal census.
“We’re going to get another three or four or five, in addition,” Mr. Trump told reporters recently, speaking about new Republican House seats. “Texas would be the biggest one, and that’ll be five.”
Despite the push from national Democrats, Democratic legislators across the country do not have a lot of options to try to redraw their own maps. Many states, such as California and Colorado, have independent commissions to redraw the maps. New York and New Jersey also rely on commissions.
In states where Democrats do control the entire redistricting process, such as Maryland, Illinois and Oregon, the maps have already been drawn to extreme Democratic advantages, with little room to squeeze out more seats in any attempt to offset Republican efforts in Texas.
According to the D.L.C.C. statement, Republican state legislative majorities oversee 55 Democratic congressional seats while Democratic state legislative majorities oversee only 35 Republican districts.
Ms. Williams acknowledged the Democratic deficit in redistricting, and she is aiming to use the issue as a motivator for focus on state legislators in the midterm elections.
“Looking at the state-by-state math, it is crystal clear Democrats must prioritize building and securing more state legislative majorities across the map if we want to go toe-to-toe with the G.O.P. on redistricting now and in 2030,” Ms. Williams said in the memo. “Building new Democratic majorities in our statehouses is imperative for putting Democrats in a stronger position now and at the end of the decade.”
Nick Corasaniti is a Times reporter covering national politics, with a focus on voting and elections.
The post Democratic Group Calls on Blue States to Draw New House Maps appeared first on New York Times.
