California Democrats led by Gov. Gavin Newsom may upend the state’s mandate for independently drawn political districts as part of a brewing, national political brawl over the balance of power in Congress and the fate of the aggressive, right-wing agenda of President Trump and the GOP.
The effort being considered by state Democratic leaders is specifically intended to reduce the number of Republicans in California’s congressional delegation, retaliation for the ongoing actions by GOP leaders in Texas to unseat Democratic representatives in its state, reportedly at Trump’s behest.
“I think this whole thing is a horrible idea all the way around … and I don’t think people fully understand the ramifications of what they’re talking about,” said Republican redistricting expert Matt Rexroad. “Once we get to the point where we’re just doing random redistricting after every election … redistricting won’t be used as a tool to reflect voter interests. It will be used to just bludgeon minority political interests, whether it be Republican or Democrat, after every election.”
Newsom already has been in talks with Democratic legislative leaders and others about reconfiguring California’s congressional district boundaries before the 2026 election.
Doing so probably would require a statewide ballot measure to scrap or temporarily pause the voter-approved, independent California Citizens Redistricting Commission charged with drawing the boundaries of congressional districts based on logical geography, shared interests, representation for minority communities and other facets. In 2010, Californians voted to create the commission to take partisan politics out of the redistricting process for Congress, two years after they did so for the state Legislature.
Newsom said California may have to take the emergency action if Texas and other GOP-controlled states this year decide to redraw their congressional districts to ensure that Republicans keep control of Congress in the upcoming election. Redrawing of congressional districts typically occurs after the decennial census to reflect population shifts across the nation.
“So they want to change the game,” he said last week. “We can act holier-than-thou. We can sit on the sidelines, talk about the way the world should be, or we can recognize the existential nature that is this moment.”
Redistricting experts in both parties agree that reverting to partisan redrawing of congressional lines in California would make several GOP incumbents vulnerable. The state’s congressional districts could be reconfigured to increase the share of Democratic voters in districts currently represented by Republicans, or in a way that forces Republican officeholders to face off against one another.
Rexroad sees a scenario in which Republicans are so packed into districts that the party would have only three safe seats. Only nine of the state’s 52 congressional districts are currently represented by the GOP.
Democratic redistricting expert Paul Mitchell said five of nine GOP-held districts could be flipped. He said Democrats are in a good position to gain seats because of California’s history of nonpartisan redistricting. In Texas, by comparison, districts already are gerrymandered to favor Republicans.
In California, “Democrats haven’t had partisan line-drawing since the ‘90s,” he said. “So there’s all this partisan gain left on the table for decades. If you ever do crack open the map, there’s just many available to bolster” the party’s existing grip on the delegation.
Rexroad warns that there would be unintended consequences, including weakening safe Republican districts in Texas and leading to a broken system in which lines are redrawn after every election to benefit whichever party controls the White House or various legislative bodies.
Before the creation of the independent Citizens Redistricting Commission, California was similar to most other states. Political districts were created by state lawmakers of both parties who often prioritized incumbent protection and gerrymandered oddly shaped districts, such as the infamous “ribbon of shame,” where a 200-mile coastal sliver of a congressional district between Oxnard and the Monterey County line disappeared during high tide.
Former U.S. Atty. Gen. Eric Holder said such districts are why he started the National Democratic Redistricting Committee with former President Obama and former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) in 2017.
“Because of our work, we now have the fairest national congressional map the country has seen in a generation, one that allows both parties to compete for the majority in the House,” Holder said Wednesday at a “Stop the Texas Takeover” virtual event hosted by the redistricting committee.
That could fall by the wayside, however, if some states crack open their redistricting process for partisan gain and states controlled by the opposing party retaliate by doing to the same.
California Democrats are considering trying to revisit the independent line-drawing after President Trump and his administration urged Texans to redraw their districts in a way that probably would improve the GOP’s ability to hold control of Congress in next year’s midterm election.
The House is narrowly divided, and the party that wins the White House often loses seats in the body two years later. The loss of a handful of GOP seats would stymie Trump’s plans, potentially making him a lame duck for two years.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott called for a special session of the state Legislature that includes redistricting and began Monday.
On Tuesday, Abbott said the decision was prompted by a court decision last year that said the state no longer has to draw “coalition districts,” which are made up of multiple minority communities.
“New maps will work toward insuring that we will maximize the ability of Texas to be able to vote for the candidate of their choice,” he said in an interview with Fox 4 Dallas-Fort Worth.
“This is shameless, shameless, the mid-decade redistricting that they’re doing at the orders of Donald Trump,” Pelosi said Wednesday at the “Stop the Texas Takeover” event. “And this is what we’re doing in California. We’re saying to the Texans, ‘You shouldn’t be going down this path. We go down this path, we’ll go down together.’”
If California Democrats pursue partisan redistricting in time for next year’s midterm election, the Legislature, in which Democrats hold a supermajority, could place the matter on the ballot during a special election that probably would take place in November. State lawmakers also could opt to make the change through legislation, though that probably would be vulnerable to a legal challenge.
Nonpartisan congressional redistricting was one of then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s priorities when it was approved by voters in 2010. Schwarzenegger hasn’t weighed in on the state potentially rescinding the reform. But the director of the USC Schwarzenegger Institute, which includes such political reforms among its top priorities, warned that weakening California’s system would be out of sync with the state’s values.
“We’re in a scary position with all this talk of this gerrymandering arms race between Texas and California,” said Conyers Davis, global director of the USC Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy. “It’s really a race to the bottom for voters in both states and the entire country as a whole. We should be celebrating California’s citizen redistricting commission and looking to expand that model into other states, not looking for political ways to dismember it and erode its powers.”
The state Republican Party, which opposed the creation of the redistricting commission, now supports the body in the face of a proposal that would cost it seats.
“To sort of start to mess with it right at this point in time, it just kind of undermines the whole independent redistricting commission that everybody has come to rely on,” said Corrin Rankin, chairwoman of the California Republican Party. “And I don’t know what it will look like constitutionally.”
Asked about Texas, she demurred, saying she was focused on California.
State Democrats, who also opposed the creation of the commission, cheered the potential response to Texas.
“Trump and Republicans — from D.C. to Texas — are attempting to rewrite the rules of our democracy,” said Rusty Hicks, chairman of the California Democratic Party. “With so much at stake, California may be left with little choice but to fight fire with fire to protect and preserve our democracy.”
Times staff writer Taryn Luna in Sacramento contributed to this report.
