Democratic lawmakers flee Texas to thwart Republican redistricting effort
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Democratic lawmakers in Texas have temporarily fled the state in a bid to block a redrawing of congressional districts intended to bolster the Republicans’ majority in the US House of Representatives.
A vote in the Texas state legislature has been scheduled for Monday to redraw its congressional map ahead of the 2026 midterm elections and try to net Republicans five more seats in the lower chamber of the US Congress. The move has been pushed by US President Donald Trump.
In order for the Texas House to vote on the measure, at least 100 of 150 members need to be present. Democrats are denying Republicans, who control the state government, a quorum by absenting themselves en masse. At least 51 of the 62 members of the Democrat caucus have broken the quorum, most of whom have left the state for Chicago.
“Texas House Democrats are taking the extraordinary and necessary step of leaving the state to deny quorum, creating a firewall against an unprecedented crisis of inaction created by governor Greg Abbott’s dereliction of duty and his submission to Donald Trump’s demands”, the Democratic caucus said in a statement on Sunday.
“This is not a decision we make lightly, but it is one we make with absolute moral clarity,” said the caucus chair Gene Wu in a statement.
He accused Abbott of “using an intentionally racist map to steal the voices of millions of Black and Latino Texans, all to execute a corrupt political deal. Apathy is complicity, and we will not be complicit in the silencing of hard-working communities who have spent decades fighting for the power that Trump wants to steal.”
The US president has said he would like to see electoral boundaries to be redrawn in various US states before his party defends its control of Congress in the midterms next year. Republicans hold the US House by a slim 219-212 majority.
“There could be some other states we’re going to get another three, or four or five in addition. Texas would be the biggest one”, Trump said earlier this month. “Just a simple redrawing we pick up five seats.”
Democrats flipped the US House two years into Trump’s first presidential term, something he does not want to happen again.
The Democratic National Committee, which governs the party at the national level, backed the Texas lawmakers’ move.
“For too long, Donald Trump and Republicans have tried to get away with rigging the system, breaking the rules, and scheming to hold on to power. It’s time to fight back”, DNC chair Ken Martin said in a statement.
“Republicans thought they could just rig the maps and change the rules without the American people taking notice. They were dead wrong . . . we’re coming full force for the Republicans’ House majority.”
Abbott called a special session of the legislature in order to push through the redistricting and respond to the devastating flooding in the state that killed more than 130 people last month. Last week, state Republicans unveiled a plan for a new map that would create five new seats that would be likely to go red in the midterms. Republicans currently hold 25 of Texas’s 38 seats in the US House.
Texas House speaker Dustin Burrows said the chamber would still convene on Monday afternoon. “If a quorum is not present then, to borrow the recent talking points from some of my Democrat Colleagues, all options will be on the table . . .”, he posted on X.
By leaving, the Texas lawmakers risk being fined $500 for each day they break the quorum.
After the Texas Democrats made their announcement, state attorney-general Ken Paxton wrote in a social media post that they should “be found, arrested, and brought back to the Capitol immediately”, and that “we should use every tool at our disposal to hunt down those who think they are above the law.”
