Texas House Democrats announced they would return to Austin Monday, ending a two-week walkout over a GOP mid-decade redistricting plan and paving the way for the map’s passage.
“We killed the corrupt special session, withstood unprecedented surveillance and intimidation and rallied Democrats nationwide to join this existential fight for fair representation — reshaping the entire 2026 landscape,” Rep. Gene Wu of Houston, chair of the House Democratic Caucus, said in a statement.
Over 50 Democratic lawmakers left Texas earlier this month for Illinois and elsewhere in a bid to stall passage of a congressional map that was demanded by President Donald Trump just four years after Republicans last redrew the state’s lines, and that is designed to give the GOP five additional U.S. House seats in next year’s midterm election.
In an unprecedented response, Republican state leaders issued civil arrest warrants, sought to extradite absent members from Illinois, launched investigations and sought to declare at least one Democrat’s seat vacant. The Legislature ended the first special session early on Friday because of the walkout, with Gov. Greg Abbott promptly calling a second overtime session with virtually the same agenda as the first one.
Though Democrats won’t have the votes to defeat the map on the floor, they framed their protest as a victory for sinking the first special session and building a national appetite among blue state leaders for their own partisan redistricting efforts in retaliation to Texas’ plan. And they said that the end of the walkout only marked the next phase of their plan to fight the map in court.
“We’re returning to Texas more dangerous to Republicans’ plans than when we left,” Wu said. “Our return allows us to build the legal record necessary to defeat this racist map in court, take our message to communities across the state and country and inspire legislators across the country how to fight these undemocratic redistricting schemes in their own statehouses.”
I started writing this post early in the day yesterday, before the Lege gaveled in, so there may be subsequent news about some extra punishment or who knows what else for the Dems when they actually arrive. And now I hope I haven’t just manifested this into existence.
Anyway. Republicans just can’t wait to get to redistricting again – the Senate committee on redistricting approved the map on Sunday, when normal people were thinking about baseball or going to the beach or the new season of Love is Blind UK. (UPDATE: The House committee passed the map bill on Monday, literally the first action in that chamber for Session II.) It’s clear that this will be the top priority again, and that any action related to the Kerr County floods will be “whenever we get to it” issues. This is the message to drone on about over and over again. It’s one of the reasons for the quorum break in the first place. Now that the Dems are back and the session will happen, make this session be about their warped priorities first and foremost.
And over in California:
California Democrats unveiled a new congressional map on Friday, aiming to counter a planned Republican gerrymander in Texas by making several GOP-held districts in the Golden State bluer while also shoring up a number of Democratic seats.
The plan was rolled out haphazardly on Friday evening, leaking to the public several hours before a committee in the state Assembly published an official version on its site.
For unclear reasons, the map was not drawn by California lawmakers. Rather, it was prepared by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the House Democrats’ official campaign arm based in Washington, D.C., according to a letter submitted to the legislature along with a presentation explaining the map.
That letter chastised Republicans in Texas and elsewhere for “doing the bidding of their DC party bosses.” In a statement, the DCCC said its map was created “with collaborative input from stakeholders and legislators” but did not offer further details about its provenance. When asked for comment about why the plan originated with the committee, a spokesperson referred The Downballot back to that statement.
Lawmakers are set to take up the proposal this week, according to a schedule released by Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas. Committees in both chambers are set to hold hearings on Tuesday and Wednesday, with final votes to put the plan before voters in a November special election expected on Thursday.
Voters will be asked whether they want to temporarily replace California’s current map, which was crafted by the state’s independent redistricting commission in 2021, with this new plan. According to Gov. Gavin Newsom, the proposal will include a provision requiring California to stand down if Republican-run states like Texas back off their plans for mid-decade redistricting.
Just below, we outline the most important changes to the five Republican districts that Democrats are targeting. In each case, we’ve also included figures showing how each current district voted in the 2024 and 2020 presidential elections, as well as how the proposed new districts would have voted in those same elections.
There’s plenty of data, as is the way of The Downballot, so check it out. There’s also now a move to do re-redistricting in Colorado, and maybe Maryland, while Trump is putting more pressure on Indiana to cave to his wishes for re-redistricting there.
And some more on how the Texas map was drawn.
In their bid for five more congressional seats, Texas Republicans are turning to an unlikely source to help spread out their gains: noncitizens.
Four of the five districts that are drawn to be newly winnable for the GOP include pockets of current Democratic-held congressional districts with low rates of citizenship. In other words, Republicans appear to be padding the new districts with people who are counted in the census, but who can’t actually vote.
“If you are Republicans, and you are seeking to maximize your seats, you have to collapse Democratic districts, and that means giving their constituents to Republican seats somewhere else,” Dave Wasserman, a political analyst with the Cook Political Report, told the Houston Chronicle. “What are the precincts that can accomplish that goal? They’re precincts with high numbers of residents but low numbers of voters.”
This is one of those interactive stories that shows you via map highlights what is going on. I had not seen this particular angle before, but it makes sense and it echoes a strategy from the 2003 Tom DeLay effort that involved low-turnout versus high-turnout Latino areas in constructing a Republican-leaning CD23.
That’s it for now. The plan, per Speaker Burrows, is to speed through all of the agenda items by Labor Day. I have my doubts about that, but that’s what they’re saying.
UPDATE Of course the Republicans made it weird.
Texas Democrats who returned to the House floor Monday are being required to sign “permission slips” and seek a personal Department of Public Safety escort just to leave the chambers, NBC News correspondent Ryan Chandler tweeted Monday afternoon.
One democrat, State Rep. Nicole Collier of District 95 in Fort Worth, refused to sign the permission slip. As of press time, she is still locked in the chamber, alone, according to Chandler.
The correspondent tweeted a photo of Collier alone in the chamber, adding, “Members are really not happy with the individual DPS escorts. Say they are not free to move on their own.”
“In my heart I don’t feel compelled to sign it,” Collier told Chandler of being forced to sign the permission slip to leave.
When asked what her plan is, Collier said, “I’ll just sit here, I don’t know… I guess I’ll wait til Wednesday.”
More on Rep. Collier’s protest here. It’s going to be a long however many days.