A federal court in Texas on Tuesday blocked Texas from using a new congressional map intended to flip several Democratic-held U.S. House of Representatives seats to Republicans in the 2026 midterm elections, faulting Governor Greg Abbott for directing the legislature to draw it based on race.
The 2-1 ruling by a three-judge panel dealt a major blow to Texas Republicans who had been urged by President Donald Trump to redraw the boundaries of the state’s congressional districts to maximize the number of Republicans who could be elected in order to protect his party’s narrow U.S. House majority.
The move by Texas to create a new map, which could flip as many as five Democratic-held seats to Republicans, set off a nationwide partisan redistricting battle, playing out in both Republican-governed and Democratic-led states.
The El Paso-based judicial panel ruled in favor of civil rights groups that challenged the map, finding “substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered” it.
Gerrymandering involves redrawing electoral district boundaries to marginalize a certain set of voters and increase the influence of others. The U.S. Supreme Court in 2019 forbade federal courts from intervening in cases involving gerrymandering done for partisan advantage. Gerrymandering predominantly driven by race remains illegal.
