Redistricting Politics: Gov Newsom Of California Signs Bills For Redrawing Voting Maps As Parties Fight For Control

California’s Democratic lawmakers want to redraw congressional maps as Texas, led by Republicans, moves toward final approval of its plans.

By Maeve Reston and Patrick Svitek, The Washington Post

California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed several bills Thursday aimed at redrawing California’s congressional maps, as Democrats try to counter Republican-driven efforts in Texas to remake its maps.

The back-and-forth marked a pivotal moment in an expanding national battle over electoral terrain — initiated by President Donald Trump — that has become increasingly heated as the two parties fight for control of Congress in next year’s midterm elections.

“They fired the first shot, Texas. We wouldn’t be here had Texas not done what they just did,” Newsom said as he signed California’s bills.

California’s plans require voters to approve changes to the state’s congressional map in a special election that the legislature, with Thursday’s votes, set for November. The 11-week campaign in California is expected to be fierce, with powerful forces and deep-pocketed donors promising to raise as much as $100 million for each side.

In the first week since opening a campaign committee, Newsom has raised more than $6 million from more than 200,000 small donors, according to his aides. There are no limits on contributions in California to ballot measure committees.

California and Texas are redrawing their maps in hopes of creating new U.S. House districts that would give their parties an advantage in next year’s midterm elections. Though those two states have acted first, other states are also moving ahead swiftly. Republicans are eyeing changes in Indiana, Ohio, Missouri and Florida. Democrats are looking at whether they can carve out more seats in Illinois.

The extraordinary fight has included an assertion from Trump that his party is “entitled” to more House seats, a two-week walkout by Texas Democrats, and an array of lawsuits and threats from both parties in multiple states.

California lawmakers say their new Democratic-leaning maps — adding as many as five blue seats in Congress — are necessary to respond to what they view as a power grab by Texas House Republicans, who approved a map Wednesday night that would give their party an edge in winning as many as five new seats in Congress. The Texas Senate is expected to ratify its new map on Friday, sending the measure to Gov. Greg Abbott (R) for his signature.

Even if California voters approve new maps and other states follow suit, Republicans are likely to gain a bigger advantage nationally, because they control more state legislatures and have fewer restrictions on gerrymandering in the states they control.

California has more hurdles in its process than in Texas, because the state constitution requires that an independent nonpartisan panel draw its congressional maps.

Thursday’s three bills create a proposed constitutional amendment that would come before voters in November, allowing them to bypass that commission and approve the Democratic-leaning maps, which will also be on the ballot.

The proposed constitutional amendment required two-thirds approval in the state Assembly and Senate. The three bills passed largely along party lines. One Assembly Democrat voted against the amendment and the special election: state Rep. Jasmeet Bains, who has announced that she is challenging U.S. Rep. David G. Valadao, a Republican, for his congressional seat in 2026. That seat would be altered to favor Democrats under the proposed changes.

Newsom signed the three bills soon after they were approved to get the orders over to California Secretary of State Shirley Weber, a Democrat, by the Friday deadline to place the measure on the Nov. 4 ballot.

“This is a rigged game,” said state Sen. Sabrina Cervantes, a Democrat who is the author of one of the bills, in a speech on the Senate floor Thursday. “We are here because the federal administration and Republicans in Congress know they are losing. They see the scoreboard. They know their playbook is unpopular, and instead of competing fairly, they are changing the rules of the game.”

Senate Republicans argued that California’s independent commission is the best way to achieve redistricting and should not be set aside, even temporarily. If voters agree to the new maps, they would be in effect for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections.

“The ends don’t justify the means,” state Sen. Tony Strickland (R) told his Democratic colleagues. “You know this is not good for democracy in California.”

Newsom has argued that Democrats have no choice but to fight back against Trump’s attempts to alter maps in other states, even as many Democrats have favored a nonpartisan approach to drawing districts in the past.

“We’re neutralizing what occurred, and we’re giving the American people a fair chance,” Newsom said. “Because when all things are equal and we’re all playing by the same set of rules, there’s no question that the Republican Party will be the minority party in the House of Representatives.”

Republican lawmakers in California tried several parliamentary maneuvers to delay the vote. The Republican leader of the Assembly, James Gallagher, noted in his speech on the floor Thursday morning that the state’s voters weighed in against gerrymandering, through ballot measures in 2008 and 2010, and created the state’s independent redistricting commission that aims to draw nonpartisan lines.

“Twice, they told us they want independent redistricting, fair representation,” Gallagher told his colleagues on the Assembly floor. “You move forward fighting fire with fire — what happens? You burn it all down. And in this case, it affects our most fundamental American principle: representation.”

Originally, Democratic lawmakers said in the bill that the changes to California’s maps would kick in only if Texas or another Republican-controlled state gives final approval to changes in its own map. But they amended the bill Thursday morning to remove that trigger language and any mention of Texas or other states.

Newsom and his Democratic allies in the legislature insist that they still support the independent redistricting committee process, which was created by voter-approved ballot measures in 2008 and 2010 and is popular with the state’s voters. But they argue that their partisan response to Texas is necessary to check the power of Trump, who urged Texas’s governor to redraw his state’s maps.

Republicans hold a 219-212 U.S. House majority with four vacancies. Democratic control would give the opposition power to thwart Trump’s legislative agenda and launch investigations into him and his administration.

GOP leaders in the California legislature have argued that Democrats controlling the process have allowed little transparency, even shrouding the identities of the lawmakers involved in drawing the new district lines.

“This is a battle between people and politicians,” Gallagher said in an interview Wednesday. “The people spoke very loudly in California twice, saying they didn’t want politicians drawing district lines, that they wanted the people to have that power. And I think that very deeply ingrained mindset in California voters is going to win out in the end.”

The Texas state House voted Wednesday along party lines, 88-52, to advance that state’s new maps. The process has been especially contentious, with Democrats fleeing the state to halt business for two weeks by denying Republicans a quorum. Upon their return, Republicans barred them from leaving the Capitol without a police escort.

State House Speaker Dustin Burrows (R) said “passage of the congressional map has ushered in a new chapter of Republican unity, and I am proud to have led my colleagues in this important achievement.”

The Texas map proposal is pending in the state Senate. The chamber’s redistricting committee advanced the legislation Thursday, and it is expected to receive a floor vote by the end of the week.

In addition to Texas and California, several other states are considering altering their maps — a process that usually takes place only once a decade following the census.

Patrick Marley contributed to this report.