Victoria Miele ’28

by Victoria Miele ’28 on February 12, 2026

In early February, the United States Supreme Court ruled to allow California to use their new Democrat-friendly congressional map. California state voters approved the new plan last year when the SCOTUS allowed Texas to use a map that favored the Grand Old Party. As Democrats and Republicans are constantly fighting for the majority in the House of Representatives, California voters thought their map would balance out Texas’s.

Gerrymandering, the process of manipulating and redrawing map lines for a particular result, has been a problem since the beginning of the U.S. Even since the drawing of the very first Congressional map in 1788, although not referred to as gerrymandering, districts were drawn in a distinct way by the Anti-Federalists in an attempt to force James Madison, a Federalist, into the same seat as James Monroe so that Madison would not end up in Congress. Although Madison did end up in Congress, it is clear that redistricting has had roots in America since its very creation.

Additionally, in the U.S., gerrymandering has been used to discriminate against voters of color. Racial gerrymandering is the process of diluting representation within communities of different races. This process of redrawing voting lines in order to suppress certain voters of different races is now illegal in the U.S.

About two months ago, the SCOTUS passed a redistricting map for Texas that gave the GOP the opportunity to potentially gain five seats in the House. This began a nationwide gerrymandering scramble for both parties, but especially for the Democrats. Due to the 2026 midterm elections being on the rise, states are wanting to redraw their districts in a way that reflects their predicted favor for the state’s dominant political party. California’s map was a way to counteract Texas’ map.

The Trump administration does not support California’s new map and claimed that it was “tainted by an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.” The administration claims that the situation in California is different than that of Texas (a map that the administration approved) because the California Republican Party and the federal government both provided different maps that would meet California’s “stated partisan goals” and because of the timing of the candidate filing periods.

Nationally, Democratic states are hopeful that the California map will push against Republican gerrymandering in Texas.

Gerrymandering and redistricting is a problem that will not go away anytime in the near future. The SCOTUS still has to make a decision on the new map in Louisiana, but based on the oral arguments made in October, it seems likely that the court’s conservative majority is going to allow the conservative map.