The last year has seen an unusual spate of mid-decade redistricting and State legislatures are at the center of these efforts in blue and red states. To offer some perspective, we sat down with Erin Covey, who leads coverage of the U.S. House for the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter, and Helen Brewer, who tracks redistricting legislation and developments for NCSL.
The last year has seen an unusual spate of mid-decade redistricting. It was initiated by President Trump in 2025 when he urged the Texas legislature to redraw maps to favor Republicans in hopes of helping the GOP hold the House and the 2026 midterms.
State legislatures are at the center of these efforts in blue and red states. To offer some perspective, we sat down with Erin Covey, who leads coverage of the U.S. House for the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter, and Helen Brewer, who tracks redistricting legislation and developments for NCSL.
Covey explained the change to congressional maps in Texas, California, Virginia, and other states and discussed how the Supreme Court decision in a Louisiana case involving the Voting Rights Act could affect numerous districts over the next few elections.
Brewer offered some perspective on the history of redistricting, including mid-decade redistricting. She also discussed the basis and ramifications of the Supreme Court decision in Louisiana v. Callais.
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Speaker 1 (00:12):
Hello and welcome to “Our American States,” a podcast from the National Conference of State Legislatures. I'm your host, Ed Smith.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Most state legislators from both parties are going to be naturally resistant to this sort of mid-decade redistricting because it is very disruptive and is disruptive to their own elections as well
Speaker 1 (00:36):
That was Erin Covey, who leads coverage of the U.S. House for the Cook Political Report with Amy Walter. She's one of my guests on this podcast along with Helen Brewer, who tracks redistricting legislation and developments for NCSL.
The last year has seen an unusual spate of mid-decade redistricting. It was initiated by President Trump in 2025 when he urged the Texas legislature to redraw maps to favor Republicans in hopes of helping the GOP hold the House and the 2026 midterms.
Covey explained the change to congressional maps in Texas, California, Virginia, and other states and discussed how the Supreme Court decision and a Louisiana case involving the Voting Rights Act could affect numerous districts over the next few elections.
Brewer offered some perspective on the history of redistricting, including mid-decade redistricting. She also discussed the basis and ramifications of the Supreme Court decision in Louisiana versus Callais.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
Here's our discussion starting with Erin Covey.
Erin, welcome to the podcast. Nice to see you.
Speaker 2 (01:47):
Hi, Ed. Good to see you ,too.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
Well, Erin, we spoke a few weeks ago and we thought this redistricting issue was pretty much settled and we were wrong. It's been a hectic few weeks. Head spinning, I would say even. Changes in lots of places. We'd already seen some changes in Texas and California, then the vote in Virginia, but then we had the Supreme Court hand down a very significant decision. And even as we speak here toward the end of May, some state legislatures are still looking at changes. So if you're listening to this, there may even be changes between when we're talking today and when this is published. But to start, let's go back to 2025 and why don't you walk us through the origins of this mid-decade redistricting and what we're seeing in a number of states. How did this ball get rolling?
Speaker 2 (02:34):
So, in terms of this cycle, there are kind of two answers to that question. The first reason that this started was back last summer when President Trump leaned on Texas members of Congress to allow the state legislature to redraw their lines, which was something that a lot of these incumbents were not on board with. Obviously, redrawing lines in the middle of the decade is not ideal both for constituents and for the members of Congress who represent them, but Republicans were going into the 2026 and midterms with an incredibly narrow three seat majority. And it was clear that Trump and his political operation were doing all that they could to potentially maximize their odds of holding onto the House despite the fact that they were in a very weak position to do so. So we saw Texas Republicans redraw their map in a way that would allow them to pick up as many as five more seats.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
Half of those are very much in place still. And then that sparked a bit of an arms race where you saw Democrats then respond by redrawing the congressional map in California, which of course they had to pass a ballot initiative to do that because California has and still does technically have an independent redistricting commission in place that typically handles this process. But in order for the Democrats and the state legislature to take over it temporarily, they had to amend the state constitution, which voters voted overwhelmingly to do last November. So, then we've seen a number of other states come on board. Trump has really heavily pressed Republicans across several states to redraw their maps. He's been successful in doing so in North Carolina and Missouri, less successful in places like Indiana. South Carolina, there's still an open question of whether or not we'll have a map there that may be answered by the time you're listening to this podcast.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
I would say for the most part, Republicans have been fairly willing to go along with something that kind of goes against their own instincts. And then of course, we've seen Democrats also try to respond in Virginia. Virginia, like California, has an independent redistricting commission. And so, in order to take over the redistricting process, Democrats had to put a ballot initiative up before voters in April. But, of course, that referendum process was completely overturned by the Virginia Supreme Court, which ruled a couple of weeks later that the way that the process had been conducted essentially was not according to the state constitution. And so that was kind of the partisan arms race that's a state of that. At the same time, you have the incredibly important decision that the U.S. Supreme Court made over Louisiana's congressional map, which in their ruling significantly weakened Section Two of the Voting Rights Act, which gives governments the ability to now draw much more aggressively gerrymandered districts because they are no longer bound by this provision of the Voting Rights Act that had protected the creation of these majority minority districts.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
So, the most direct impact that has had on redistricting right now is in Southern states where, of course, there are a number of majority Black districts that have been in place for decades and have been protected by the Voting Rights Act for decades. And now essentially the Republicans who are in control of redistricting in these states have a lot more freedom to demolish these districts, it appears under the latest ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court. So, we saw the ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court. Of course, that overturned Louisiana's map directly, but then we saw a number of other Southern states, Alabama and Tennessee and South Carolina, also take up redistricting in response. And then on top of that, you also had states like Ohio and Utah that redrew their maps this cycle as a result of longstanding battles over their lines that dated back to the 2022 redistricting cycle.
Speaker 2 (06:47):
Ohio's new map slightly benefits Republicans, but was really a mixed bag for them. And then Utah's new map will allow Democrats to easily pick up a seat there. So, you've had both a combination of major legal developments and then also the fact that this partisan redistricting battle has been sparked by Trump and his effort to retain the majority.
Speaker 1 (07:11):
Well, like I said, head spinning developments. That Supreme Court decision certainly looks like it's going to have ramifications now, but it certainly appears that that will have long legs in terms of 2028, 2030 when states redistrict after the 2030 census. Let me ask you about legislatures. This is an NCSL podcast. So, of course, we're real interested in what the role of legislatures has been, and they're involved in all this. As you point out, in some cases in Texas, the legislature was able to make this decision without going to the voters in Virginia and California. They did go to the voters because they have redistricting commissions. But what else have legislatures done? You mentioned Indiana. What other reactions have we seen from legislatures as they've been faced with this issue?
Speaker 2 (07:59):
Yeah, look, I mean, I think most state legislators from both parties are going to be naturally resistant to this sort of mid-decade redistricting because it is very disruptive and is disruptive to their own elections as well. In a lot of states, they've had to push back primary dates, which of course affects their own reelection prospects. State legislators also have different interests that don't always align with the national party's interests. But I do think that overall we have seen we live in such a hyper-polarized climate and the stakes of this battle have become so high that state legislators in a lot of places have been kind of willing to set aside their own interest to benefit their own national party at the congressional level, but it has been mixed. So we saw Republican state legislators in Missouri and North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama have been very quick to redraw their congressional maps, but there has been resistance among Republicans in Indiana most consequentially because in Indiana, you saw a really heavy push to go forward with a new map that was passed by the State House but was then not passed by the State Senate because a large number of Republicans opposed redistricting.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
And then of course you saw Trump enacted retribution campaigns against those seven Republican state senators who voted against redistricting and were up for reelection this cycle. And we saw five out of seven of them ousted, one survived, one is in a race that is very close and still has not been called. They face consequences for that and it'll be interesting to see how that affects the view of state legislators in a place like South Carolina, for example, where there has been some resistance among Republicans again in the state Senate to redrawing their maps. And for a lot of these state legislators, they have close relationships with the members of Congress, particularly members of Congress who have been there for a long time and someone like Jim Clyburn who has represented the state's lone blue district for a very long time now, they may have an interest in having one Democrat in their delegation because that gives them the ability to have more sway with a Democratic presidential administration in theory.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
It's been a pretty mixed bag. On the Democratic side, you've also seen a mixed reaction in terms of how willing state legislators are to redistrict. In Maryland, the state House was very willing to redraw their map this cycle, but in the state Senate, there was quite a bit of resistance, particularly from the state Senate president, Bill Ferguson. And he also is now in a primary that has been spurred by his resistance to redistricting despite the fact that he was under a lot of pressure, both from the national party, from Jeffries, but also from the Governor Wes Moore and from the leaders in the state House who were supportive of redistricting. You've also seen in Illinois, there was a push to redistrict that also went nowhere because of resistance from state legislators. So, it's been really interesting to see this play out in blue states as well as red states.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
And I think going into 2028 because of the Supreme Court's decision on the Voting Rights Act, we'll probably see a couple of other Southern states take up redistricting in 2028 and then there's going to be even more pressure on other blue states to redraw their lines in response to the Republican gains. And that could be in places like Colorado, New Jersey, New York, Washington, Minnesota. These are places where Democrats have all talked about redistricting, but I think it remains to be seen how willing some of these state legislatures are to go along with the process.
Speaker 1 (11:51):
Erin, let me ask you about the Supreme Court decision. Elsewhere on the podcast, Helen Brewer from NCSL gets into the nitty gritty of the decision, but I wonder from your perspective, how many seats could this change from Democrat to Republican over the next few cycles?
Speaker 2 (12:08):
Yeah, that's a number that's difficult to judge because in some places, particularly in places like Georgia, for example, in Texas, which also have very large suburban populations that have changed politically over the past decade, it's not as simple as just like cracking open a Black majority district and dividing it up into red seats that would be easy for Republicans to hold. That's what Republicans are able to do and will be able to do in places like Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee. It could potentially affect around a dozen seats I would say across the South, but I think the political realities of having to redistribute all these voters could prevent Republicans from totally, I think, maximizing or wanting to totally maximize their power there. I think it really remains to be seen in terms of the seat gain. I've seen a number of different projections. Some have been a lot scarier for Democrats in terms of the number of seats that could be targeted.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
In the short term, look, we're seeing in Alabama and Louisiana and Tennessee and maybe South Carolina, one Democratic seats in each of these states get drawn out. Republicans could go further in both Louisiana and Alabama and draw out a second majority black seat there and go back to the drawing board. I don't know if they will do that in 2028. It wouldn't entirely surprise me because again, these are areas that are very racially polarized and are pretty red-leaning states for the most part with the exception of these urban areas that are majority Black. That could certainly have a really significant impact on Democratic power in the South in particular.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
You and I have discussed this question before and I wonder what your opinion is now. Are we at the end of this for the 2026 cycle? Have we finally gotten to the point where deadlines are going to determine how much more can be done or is there still stuff you think is going to happen?
Speaker 2 (14:27):
At the point at which we're recording the podcast, there are still a number of court cases that are ongoing and Republicans in the Southern states that have just now taken up redistricting have been more than willing not only to move back primaries, but also to essentially disregard early votes that were already cast in some of these primaries in Alabama and Louisiana. So that has been really remarkable to watch. At this point, the Alabama map is still not set in stone. So the Supreme Court essentially released an injunction that had been blocking Republicans from going back to the map they passed in 2023, which is the one that they want to enact this cycle. Republicans pushed back the primary date for all of the affected districts into August. And so they're assuming that that's the map that they will be able to use, but the lower court still has to make a decision and there is a hearing on that, I believe tomorrow, so that would be May 22nd.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
So, we'll see how that resolves. There's a chance that the Alabama map does not actually hold up this cycle. In Tennessee, there are also multiple lawsuits both under federal law and state law over their redrawn map, which completely cracked the lone blue seat in Memphis into three deep red seats. And then in Florida, there is also a case over the map that was redrawn there because in Florida, actually, there is a state law that bans partisan gerrymandering. So, we'll see how that case is resolved. And then finally, yes, the South Carolina redistricting process as we speak is still in the middle of happening and we'll see what the state Senate does.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
There was a map that was passed by the State House that would put Jim Clyburn in a district that would be difficult for him to win, but we don't know the final end of that story. And South Carolina, they have a June primary. They will probably need to push that back if this process takes much longer.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
A few weeks ago, people who watch this space closely, people like you, I think thought maybe this isn't all that consequential for all the sound and fury that we've had over the last year. Now a few weeks later with all the developments you've just been discussing, it does look like Republicans have something of the upper hand, but I wanted to revisit that question with you. Where would you say things stand now? How much has this changed the playing field for the 2026 congressional election?
Speaker 2 (17:18):
Prior to the Supreme Court's decision on Callais and prior to the Virginia Supreme Court's decision, it looked like the net effect of all this redistricting was going to be a wash with neither party picking up a significant number of seats on net. Now that has changed. So, Republicans do have a structural advantage in the redistricting battles, but it is still not enough to protect them from losing the House necessarily. And the way we see it, Democrats do still have an advantage in winning the House in November because the national environment favors them so much based on the traditional metrics that we look at when we are handicapping these House races in a midterm cycle. Trump's approval rating is very low. It's plummeted below 40%. A lot of that is driven by frustration over the Iran war and rising gas prices, but it was low before due to the state of the economy and frustration with Americans over that.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
And then, of course, we've seen Democratic enthusiasm is much higher than Republican enthusiasm, despite the fact that a lot of Democratic voters don't like the leaders of their own party. They're still more than willing to go out and vote for Democratic candidates in these elections and special elections and off-year elections and in primaries we've seen that, too. And so all of the environmental factors still look good for Democrats for sure. Our estimation in terms of how much this affects the playing field is that Republicans will probably net maybe another five to seven seats as a result of redistricting. A total best case scenario for Republicans is they maybe net closer to a dozen seats, but that's assuming that they win a lot of these new districts that were drawn in Texas and in Florida that are still quite competitive. There is a world in which Democrats hold all four of the seats that were redrawn to favor Republicans in Florida, just because of the fact that a lot of these districts have large Hispanic populations and there has been a lot of backlash among Hispanic voters to Trump, even though they had moved toward him significantly in the 2024 election.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
And so that is still an open question. I mean, if you put that into perspective, say Republicans draw themselves an additional five seats effectively on net, that gives them basically an eight seat majority adding that to their three seat majority. And in the average midterm cycle, the party out of power has picked up two dozen seats on average. Even in 2022, which wasn't a great cycle for Republicans, Republicans still picked up nine seats in the House. So having an effectively eight seat majority is very much not a guarantee to hold the House. And it also doesn't even really give Republicans an advantage. It looks like Democrats still have an advantage in that battle. So definitely makes things harder. Democrats, I would say Democrats were the overwhelming favorite to hold or to win the House before these latest developments. That is probably no longer the case, but I do still think they have a clear advantage.
Speaker 1 (20:36):
Well, I know that an awful lot of people look to the Cook Political Report when they're trying to handicap these things. So thank you for laying that out for us because I think that's probably what many see as the gold standard.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Well, thank you.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
As we close up here, let me ask you, has this changed the future? Has this changed the way we're going to do redistricting down the road? Are we going to see more mid-decade redistricting? Is this a one-off or do you think this is something that's probably going to continue to be an issue?
Speaker 2 (21:06):
I think it will at least continue to be an issue for the rest of this decade. We're certainly going to see more redistricting in the 2028 cycle, both from red states and blue states. It wouldn't surprise me if we see more redistricting in 2030. And then of course, we'll get a little bit of a reset in 2032 after the census. The 2030 census is conducted and population is reapportioned and every state takes up redistricting. And at that point, I'll be curious how maximal some of these states go and also whether or not between now and then there has been any effort to completely disband some independent redistricting commissions that were put in place last decade or the decade before. Currently, the provision in California is that the Independent Commission will take over the process at the end of the decade, but there's still time Democrats could change that if they wanted to with another ballot initiative.
Speaker 2 (22:04):
And I think tensions are so high right now that neither side is going to willingly disarm in any way. And so we'll see what happens, but yeah, under our current system, under our current hyperpolarized environment, this is kind of the inevitable end result.
Speaker 1 (22:25):
Well, Erin, thank you so much for sharing your extremely well-earned perspective on this issue. I can't imagine how much time you're spending paying attention to all this because I think for those of us who are sort of amateurs, it's a lot of effort to kind of keep track of everything that's going on. So I really appreciate you taking the time to do this and I guess we'll see what happens. Take care.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
We will see. And if you subscribe to the Cook Political Report, you can see our redistricting tracker where I try to keep this updated with developments as they're happening in all these states, but we also have our kind of overall range of results from all of this redistricting on that page as well.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
I'll be right back after the short break with Helen Brewer from NCSL.
Speaker 3 (23:23):
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Speaker 1 (24:40):
Helen, welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 4 (24:42):
Thanks so much for having me.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
So Helen, you track legislation and particularly redistricting issues in state legislatures around the country. Starting last year, we've seen a lot of changes in the usual approach to redistricting, which usually occurs only after the census. First, President Trump urged Texas to make changes, then California made changes and now we've had a consequential decision from the US Supreme Court that affects redistricting. So break all this down for us.
Speaker 4 (25:12):
States are required to draw new congressional and state legislative districts every 10 years after the census. The reason for this is so that states can satisfy the constitutional principle of one person, one vote, meaning districts are made up of equal numbers of people. While this typically takes place once every 10 years, it's also true that every decade there are states redrawing their maps in any given year, almost always pursuant to a court order. What is much less common is what we've been seeing over the course of the last several months: States making the decision to draw new congressional maps of their own volition without any court order forcing them to do so. This year's other big twist in redistricting comes from the US Supreme Court's recent decision in Louisiana v. Callais. To put a very complex issue in a very small nutshell, this case asked whether redistricters can constitutionally use race as a decision-making factor when attempting to comply with the federal Voting Rights Act or whether using race in that way violates the Constitution's prohibition on racial gerrymandering.
Speaker 4 (26:20):
The Supreme Court held that it is constitutional for redistricters to consider race when seeking to comply with the VRA, but only under certain circumstances. These circumstances exist when a set of legal factors called the jingles criteria are met. The jingles test has been around since the 1980s and the Colley decision makes significant alterations to them. The original jingles factors say that in order to demonstrate that a map violates the VRA, challengers in court must be able to show that there is a non-white population that is large and geographically concentrated enough to constitute more majority minority districts than the state drew in its map and that voting in the area is racially polarized, meaning the non-white population tends to vote one way and the white population in the area consistently votes the other way, defeating the non-white community's preferred candidates. After evaluating the jingles factors, a court could then consider the totality of the circumstances, looking at evidence of the history and effects of racial discrimination in the state or area at issue to further evaluate whether the VRA had been violated.
Speaker 4 (27:34):
Importantly, plaintiffs challenging a map under the VRA were not required to prove that the state intended to engage in racial discrimination. The Clay decision reformulates the Gingles factors, marking a big change from the way the VRA has been litigated for the last 40 years. Moving forward, the map that plaintiffs show in court demonstrating it is possible to draw additional majority minority districts, that hypothetical map must be drawn without using race and it must satisfy all of the state's original redistricting criteria and partisan or political goals. After that, the racially polarized voting analysis must completely disentangle race and politics to clearly demonstrate that the difference in white and non-white voter behavior is the results of race alone, not differences in partisan preference. Finally, the Clay decision instructs courts not to give much weight to the totality of the circumstances evidence I mentioned before and instead challengers will now be required to present evidence that supports a strong inference that intentional racial discrimination is behind the map.
Speaker 4 (28:46):
Litigants and judges will be an uncharted territory in future VRA redistricting cases under these new rules coming down from Callais and in the more immediate, much more concrete future, the Callais decision has already prompted several states to begin drawing new congressional maps. For some of these states, part of their theory about why they need to draw new maps now is that they have districts that were previously drawn to comply with the VRA and they may now believe that the process of creating those districts runs afoul of CLA's new rules for VRA compliance and analysis.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
Well, that's the most detailed analysis of the decision I've heard and that's very helpful. I want to ask you a history question. We know Texas did a mid-decade redistricting 20 or so years ago. There are numerous instances of changes made with court orders, but going back in the long history of state legislatures, was this mid-decade redistricting more common in the past?
Speaker 4 (29:48):
The historical research that is out there that I have taken a look at and have found very helpful shows that mid-decade redistricting absent a court order, so that type of mid-decade redistricting we've just seen recently that feels atypical for us was not uncommon in the 1800s in particular. Then it became less common again throughout most of the 20th century and then of course through today. You mentioned we saw some efforts in the early 2000s and then of course again here in the mid 2020s. Although I should say that in the 20th century around the 1980s, there were a few attempts from states to draw congressional or legislative maps in the middle of a decade of their own volition. But again, the 1800s is the last time that mid-decade redistricting was particularly common. In the 1800s, anytime the party in power changed in a state legislature, that was when we would see mid-decade redistricting.
Speaker 4 (30:45):
I will also point out that in the 1800s and in the first half of the 20th century, a lot of states redistricted less than once per decade until the 1960s when the United States Supreme Court adopted that one person, one vote doctrine. So when we look at the early 2000s, like you started off mentioning, between 2003 and 2005 or thereabouts, Colorado, Georgia, and Texas each attempted mid-decade redistricting of their own volition like what we've seen in the last several months. So these were states deciding to redistrict absent a court order, just their own initiative for that decision. How this got resolved varied a little bit in each of those three states. Texas's 2003 mid-decade redistricting went all the way up to the United States Supreme Court. And in kind of a side note of that opinion, it wasn't the main legal question at issue, but the U.S. Supreme Court suggested that the federal constitution and federal law don't have anything that would prohibit mid-decade congressional redistricting.
Speaker 4 (31:51):
So we know that it's likely that there are no obstacles in federal law to mid-decade redistricting. And then when it came to Colorado and Georgia's mid-decade redistricting efforts in the early 2000s, the state Supreme Courts in those states were the ones that resolved those issues. The Supreme Court of Colorado took a look at state law and decided that it prohibits mid-decade redistricting, Colorado law does. And the Supreme Court of Georgia made a finding more similar to the US Supreme Court in the Texas case. They said that nothing Georgia law prohibits mid-decade redistricting, although those Georgia maps, the mid-decade maps from the early 2000s were later struck down by the United States Supreme Court for unrelated reasons.
Speaker 1 (32:37):
Well, I can't tell you how many news stories I've read that called mid-decade redistricting unprecedented. Sounds like there are plenty of examples if you go back far enough. Now we're talking about redistricting U.S. House seats, but states also create the maps for state legislative seats. In the past, have states ever done mid-decade redistricting on state legislative seats?
Speaker 4 (33:00):
This one is maybe a little bit trickier to answer because as you mentioned, a lot of attention is on congressional districts all the time, even though for us at NCSL, the state legislature is what we're always focused on. But we do know from our research of at least a few instances of states attempting to undertake mid-decade redistricting for their state legislative seats in the last several decades. And the way that we can pinpoint these is because we do have a handful of court cases, state court cases where the courts stepped in and had to decide, much like in the early 2000s, Colorado, Georgia, Texas cases, whether or not state law would permit mid-decade redistricting. So at least six states have tried to undertake mid-decade redistricting for the state legislatures in the last 75 years or so. That's a really broad range of time. But like I said, it does seem like it's probably at least in recent history, less common or similarly common, I guess, really as the congressional mid-decade redistricting, since we don't typically see too much of that either.
Speaker 4 (34:09):
And just like with those congressional cases from the early 2000s, there were a mix of outcomes. In some states, courts decided that mid-decade redistricting for state legislative districts was either permitted or at least not prohibited by state law and in some other states courts found that mid-decade state legislative redistricting was prohibited or was prohibited in at least some of the specific ways that these attempts played out. I think the other thing to note here and maybe why we have generally seen more attention on congressional mid-decade redistricting attempts or maybe just more congressional attempts overall is because states are more likely to dictate the timing of state legislative redistricting than congressional redistricting overall. So in all 50 states, there is a law on the books that says something about the timing of state legislative redistricting. That's not always a law that says, "This is when you can do it and that is it.“
Speaker 4 (35:12):
But there is at least something that says you must draw new state legislative districts every 10 years. And so then courts can take a look at that and decide if that means that's the only time or if other times are permissible. But not all states mention even that much about congressional redistricting in their state laws, let alone saying whether or not it's allowed. So, state law has more information about the timing of state legislative redistricting for lawmakers to go off of, or perhaps be constrained by, than it typically does for congressional redistricting. So I think that explains maybe a little bit more about why we haven't seen as much attention on state legislative districts.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
There are people on both sides of the aisle who are not happy about how this mid-decade redistricting has played out. Are there states taking action around this seeking to pass legislation related to when redistricting can take place in their state?
Speaker 4 (36:11):
We have seen at least 20 bills introduced in seven states and Congress. So a few of those are federal pieces of legislation that are looking to, for the most part, prohibit mid-decade redistricting, usually by some mix of saying redistricting will happen every 10 years and at no other time, or by explicitly saying redistricting in between decennial censuses is not allowed, something along those lines. Most of these bills have either already died or are not particularly likely to move, but they are still obviously I think a response to what we have seen with mid-decade redistricting in the last several months. It shows that this is a topic and an issue that is on lawmakers' radars and these bills in the states and in Congress, there's a mixture of bills coming from members of the majority party and the minority party in any given state or in Congress and those seven states that have introduced bills include states that have and have not faced redistricting pressure in the last several months.
Speaker 4 (37:16):
So it is something that is on lawmakers minds, although there might not be any new laws on this enacted, but I think this legislation being introduced still shows how significant and salient, of course, this topic is right now.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
More than a dozen states have commissions of one sort or another to handle redistricting. I just wonder how those played out in this effort. I know a little bit about what happened in California, but fill us in on that. How are those commissions affected?
Speaker 4 (37:50):
The mid-decade redistricting of the last few months has been undertaken of state's own volition. In many of these states like Texas and Missouri, the legislatures have primary redistricting authority. So they've been able to say, "We want a new map. Let's look into that and enact a new map." In states with redistricting commissions that have primary authority over redistricting, the path for a legislature looking to redistrict right now is not quite as clear. California and Virginia are our two examples of what this looks like so far. In those two states, redistricting commissions are created by the state constitutions. For the legislature to exercise temporary authority over redistricting and pass new maps right now, lawmakers in both of those states determined that they needed to ask voters to approve state constitutional amendments allowing legislative redistricting to move forward in this mid-decade moment instead of commission-led redistricting. Both the California and Virginia ballot measures did stipulate that redistricting authority will revert to the redistricting commissions in 2031.
Speaker 4 (39:00):
Both of these ballot measures passed California's by a very wide margin in November 2025 and Virginia's by just two or three percentage points in April 2026. California's new congressional maps resulting from this ballot measure are in effect, but Virginia's maps were quickly struck down by the State Supreme Court in early May. The court held that the Virginia legislature did not follow the proper legislative process when they referred the redistricting measure to the ballot, which violated the state constitution. Over these last few decades, voters have commonly approved measures taking authority away from legislatures and giving it to redistricting commissions. And the last interesting thing to note here is that the results in the California and Virginia ballot measure elections, despite the ultimate fate of the Virginia map, are the first time that we have ever seen voters affirmatively decide to go the other way from commission back to legislative redistricting.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
So, as we wrap up, let me ask you about a group of people I think are the unsung heroes in our country and don't get much credit and often get a lot of criticism and that's election administrators. They really have a tough job and how are they affected by this mid-decade redistricting?
Speaker 4 (40:20):
As you mentioned, election administrators are doing a lot of work to run elections smoothly, accurately, and securely all of the time. Election administrators are the folks at the city and county level who are really responsible for the nuts and bolts of how elections are run and among many other things, this includes getting ballots designed, making sure the correct candidates and the correct races for the correct offices are on each ballot, getting ballots printed and then distributed, which does include getting ballots sent to polling places where people will appear to vote in person on election day or during early voting and also in the mail to voters who have been approved for absentee ballots or in states where the vast majority of people vote by mail. If you think about your ballot when you receive it in the mail, it includes only the races going on where you live that you are going to be voting for.
Speaker 4 (41:17):
We all live in the U.S. so if it's a presidential election, we all see the presidential race, then you live in your particular state, so you see your state's governor race and then we each live in one particular congressional district, and we see the race for that seat in Congress. So each voter's ballot or the ballots that are prepared for each precinct need to reflect that correct congressional district, focusing on that here since that's the mid-decade redistricting issue that is going on right now. The longer it remains unclear which district is where and which district each voter lives in or each polling place is located in, the more risk there starts to be that it will be a bit of a scramble very close in time to the election to make sure that the correct number of ballots are printed, sent to the correct voters and even if there is enough time to get that done smoothly, the feeling of uncertainty still persists for quite some time for election administrators when they know that they're waiting on potential last minute changes to how elections will be run and in this case to the districts and what elections are even going to take place where.
Speaker 4 (42:32):
Again, the longer that remains uncertain, election administrators don't know how much time they will have when all is said and done to confirm which voters are in which congressional districts and need which ballot reflecting which congressional races. At the same time, election administrators are also up against other deadlines for election preparation coming from state law or other timelines and rules and just the practical deadlines of, again, getting all this work done and hopefully not feeling completely overwhelmed or rushed. Overall, when we have late breaking map changes or long lasting uncertainty about what maps are in effect, if maps are challenged in court or there's a referendum about the mid-decade redistricting, this uncertainty for election administrators is prolonged and last but not least, there also might be an element of voter confusion to this. Voters may not know which districts they are in for some time in Virginia right now. That’s certainly the case and they may not even be aware that their districts are changing.
Speaker 4 (43:36):
The last thing I will say here is that this is important to keep in mind for election administrators who, like you said, are often overworked and under resourced already, but it is also true that in the states that have recently undertaken mid-decade redistricting, a lot of this hecticness might have settled down by now in a lot of the states. It may be the case that the really tight squeeze for election administrators was or is going to be the primary elections and then there is lots of time before the general election in November, that schedule might be able to calm back down to normal depending on how the map drawing and litigation timeline goes in states and election administrators will still be running an accurate and secure election. It just I think is worth it for lawmakers and others to be aware of the effects of late breaking changes to district maps and other election policies for that matter too when they are thinking about making some changes.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
Well, I certainly hope folks appreciate the tough job that they have. And Helen, thanks so much for breaking all this down for us and I guess we'll see what happens on Election Day. Thanks very much.
Speaker 4 (44:48):
Yes, thank you.
Speaker 1 (44:54):
I've been talking with Erin Covey from the Cook Political Report and Helen Brewer from NCSL about the last year of mid-decade redistricting efforts and their impact. Thanks for listening.
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