Texas Republicans released a proposed new congressional map Wednesday that would give the GOP a path to pick up five seats in next year’s midterm elections.
The proposal, which follows President Donald Trump's public pressing for a new map in the state, would shift district lines in ways that would target current Democratic members of Congress in districts in and around Austin, Dallas and Houston, as well as two already endangered Democrats representing South Texas districts that Trump carried last year.
If it were enacted, the proposal could have a major effect on the battle for control of the House of Representatives in 2026. Republicans hold a slim, eight-seat advantage in the House right now, but this map could add extra padding as they seek to keep the House for the final two years of Trump's presidency. They already control 25 of the 38 congressional districts in Texas.
In a sign of how carefully the new lines are drawn to maximize the GOP's standing, Trump would have carried 30 out of 38 seats on the new map last year, none by single-digit margins. Democratic voters would be packed into eight districts that former Vice President Kamala Harris would have won by at least 15 percentage points apiece last year, according to analysis from the nonpartisan Texas Legislative Council.
The proposed map was filed by state Rep. Todd Hunter, who represents a coastal area in southeastern Texas and is a member of the state House Select Committee on Congressional Redistricting, which was created last week as part of the special legislative session called by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott.
The proposal may still change before lawmakers consider it further, and members of the committee may still refer new proposals for consideration throughout the special session.
At the moment, members of the committee are scheduled to discuss the proposed map at a meeting Friday. Legislative Democrats, however, have suggested they could interrupt the broader process by leaving the state and denying Republicans the quorum necessary to advance a bill.
The mid-decade redistricting effort, like many regularly scheduled map redrawings, is steeped in partisan politics, with an eye toward helping Republicans hold on to their narrow House majority in next year’s midterm elections.
The New York Times reported last month that members of Trump’s political operation had privately urged Texas Republicans to redraw their maps ahead of the 2026 midterms. And Trump publicly praised the efforts, pressing Texas lawmakers this month to take actions that would help the GOP gain five House seats.
State Rep. Gina Hinojosa, a Democrat representing Austin who helped organize a walkout by Democratic lawmakers in 2021 to counter a GOP attempt to tighten voting laws, told NBC News that she and her colleagues were ready to "fight with everything we got."
"What happens in Texas will inform what happens in other states. This is Trump’s attempt to block accountability, to block the voters, because he is afraid of the voters and what we will do to him in the 2026 midterms," she said.
Hinojosa said that as state Democrats continue to weigh whether to flee the state again to deprive the Legislature of the number of lawmakers needed to pass bills, she believes the 2021 "quorum break" was "wildly successful in ways we could have never anticipated," arguing it both elevated the Democrats' argument and led Republicans to remove two provisions in the legislation that Democrats opposed.
How the new lines differ from the old
The lines in the newly proposed maps cut into the South Texas congressional districts held by Democrats Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez, the Dallas-area district held by Julie Johnson and the Houston-area district held by Al Green. The newly proposed lines would also effectively combine the Austin-area districts held by Democrats Greg Casar and Lloyd Doggett.
According to a review of the maps and demographic and voting data by NBC News, the proposed boundaries would appear to put more Latino voters in Cuellar’s new district — a move that bets that demographic shifts in the area are helpful for Republicans. Gonzalez’s proposed district includes substantially more white voters than the current version.
Green’s seat, meanwhile, would be redrawn to include substantially more white and Latino voters and far fewer Black voters. Green, who has represented the district since 2005, introduced articles of impeachment against Trump just last month. Another Houston-area district, the 18th, would be friendlier to Democrats, moving from one Harris won by almost 40 percentage points last year to one she would have won by 54 points.
Johnson, whose current district is majority nonwhite, would represent one almost evenly split between white and nonwhite voters, which Trump would have won by almost 18 points.
And while Rep. Marc Veasey's Dallas-area 33rd District would remain heavily Democratic, areas around his hometown, Fort Worth, would be moved out of his district and into a safe Republican district.
Then there are Casar and Doggett. The new lines raise the possibility that the two Democrats would have to run in a primary against each other — a prospect Casar vowed to fight, raising the prospect of legal action.
“Merging the 35th and the 37th districts is illegal voter suppression of Black and Latino Central Texans,” Casar wrote on X. “By merging our Central Texas districts, Trump wants to commit yet another crime — this time, against Texas voters and against The Voting Rights Act.”
“United, we will fight back with everything we’ve got,” Casar wrote. “If Trump is allowed to rip the Voting Rights Act to shreds here in Central Texas, his ploy will spread like wildfire across the country. Everyone who cares about our democracy must mobilize against this illegal map.”
Trump last year carried two of the 13 Texas seats Democrats currently hold, the South Texas districts of Cuellar and Gonzalez. Cuellar’s district went to Trump by 7 points, while Gonzalez’s went to him by 4 points, according to analysis by NBC News’ Decision Desk. Cuellar won his seat by less than 6 points, while Gonzalez was victorious by less than 3 points, illustrating the slim margins at play in the region.
Looking at the 2024 election results through the Texas GOP's proposed maps, Trump would have won both their districts by 10 points.
Harris won Doggett's current seat by 34 points and Casar's by 49 points. But under the proposed maps, she would have won the new, sole Austin-centered seat by 56 points, while Trump would have carried the other seat, centered more prominently around San Antonio, by 10 points.
The redistricting process typically occurs at the start of each new decade, when new census data is available. Texas’ maps, which were drawn in 2021, are still being fought over in court, with a lawsuit alleging they discriminate against Black and Latino voters.
State Democratic Party Chairman Kendall Scudder slammed the proposal in a statement, accusing state Republicans of kowtowing to Trump and vowing to fight its implementation.
“Texas Republicans have finally revealed their new redistricting map, and unsurprisingly, it is drawn to represent Donald Trump, not the voices of Texans. It is illegally drawn in a way that silences the voices of minority communities across Texas,” Scudder said, adding: “Texas Democrats will use every available method to oppose this racist, desperate power grab. Nothing is off the table.”
The maps are certain to face resistance from actors outside party politics, as well. The question is whether any legal action would prevent a new map from taking effect for the 2026 election.
Dan Vicuna, the senior policy director for voting and fair representation at the government watchdog group Common Cause, said on a call with reporters before the proposed maps were filed that the group would legally challenge any maps filed in Texas that it felt were "gerrymandered."
"We will sue," Vicuna said. "We've been there before, and we will absolutely be there again to challenge unfair maps, regardless of who draws them."
