Texas currently has 38 seats in the U.S. House with 25 held by Republicans, 12 by Democrats, and one vacant seat. (A replacement election for the heavily Democratic vacant seat has been slow-rolled by the Republican Governor.) Even if we assign the vacant seat to Democrats, Republicans still hold 66% of the U.S. House seats in Texas.
As another data point, consider the statewide elections for federal offices held since 2020 in Texas:
- 2020 U.S. President: Donald Trump (R) beat Joe Biden (D) 52% to 46%.
- 2020 U.S. Senate: John Cornyn (R) beat M.J. Hager (D) 54% to 44%.
- 2024 U.S. President: Donald Trump (R) beat Kamala Harris (D) 56% to 42%.
- 2024 U.S. Senate: Ted Cruz (R) beat Colin Allred (D) 53% to 45%.
Using the numbers for the worst Democratic showing this decade, Republicans account for 56% of the Texas electorate. From a purely numeric standpoint, Republicans could rightfully claim 21 of the state’s 38 seats – not the 25 seats they granted themselves with the district map they drew in 2021.
But now, Texas Republicans are collectively saying “Hold my beer.” Despite having loudly defended the 2021 district map as fair, they have responded to Trump’s explicit call for five additional GOP seats in Texas by producing yet another district map that meets their master’s demand.
Democratic communities in Austin, Dallas, Houston, and the southern Texas border will be shredded and apportioned into Republican strongholds.
For example, my home city of Austin is currently represented in the U.S. House by two Democratic Representatives, Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX) in District 37 and Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX) in District 35. Given that the Austin metropolitan area is largely Democratic, there would be more Democratic seats if it weren’t for the 2021 gerrymander that carved off whole sections of Austin voters into various rural Republican districts surrounding Austin. A gerrymandered District 10 even cut a thin path straight through Austin to join those unfortunate residents with Republican voters on both the east and west sides of Austin.
In the new map, District 37 will be compressed to be the sole Democratic district in Central Texas, District 35 will be moved completely out of Austin, and more Austin voters will be moved into a still very red District 10. Even worse, many Austin voters will be moved into District 11 – a Republican district that will meander well over 300 miles from Odessa to Taylor, completely overwhelming the Austin area voters therein. Full disclosure: I will be one of those overwhelmed Austin voters.
As a whole, the proposed new district map will gerrymander Democratic voters into districts where Republicans will be heavily favored to win 30 of the 38 seats – a whopping 79% of the Texas seats in the U.S. House.
Enough Democrats in the Texas House recently left the state to deny Republicans the quorum they need to approve the new map. It is worth noting that Texas is one of only four states whose constitution requires 2/3 of its legislature to form a quorum. Texans have long been wary of government and that 2/3 requirement was not an accident. Allowing a repressed minority to deny the Texas House a quorum was intended as a last resort to protect against government overreach.
Of course, Republicans have responded with escalating threats. As of this writing:
- Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) defended the new map by saying “A lot of people who voted Republican, who voted for Donald Trump, were trapped into Democrat districts.” In choosing to ignore the fact that many more Democrats were trapped into Republican districts, Abbott is admitting that he is not the Governor of Texas; he is only the Governor of Texas Republicans. He has petitioned the Texas Supreme Court to vacate the office of State Rep. Gene Wu (D-TX), the Texas House Democratic Caucus chairman, claiming that he has violated his oath of office and abandoned his seat. This is despite the fact that Wu and his fellow Democrats have the overwhelming support of their constituents who have no desire to be represented by Republicans who will not be responsive to their needs.
- Attorney General Ken Paxton (R-TX) felt the need to one-up Abbott by separately asking the Texas Supreme Court to expel all of the out-of-state Texas Democrats from their offices.
Is there anything in the Texas Constitution that allows the Texas Supreme Court to simply declare the seats of elected officials to be vacant?
While “No” is the obvious answer, our state government relies on an independent judiciary to make that judgment. The law in Texas is what the Texas Supreme Court say it is. Since a majority of the Texas Supreme Court is composed of individuals placed there by Gov. Abbott, I’m not holding my breath for non-partisan rulings.
Separately:
- Texas House Speaker Dustin Burrows (R-TX) issued civil arrest warrants for the absent Democrats.
- Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) made a blatantly partisan request to the FBI for their aid in hunting down the out-of-state Democrats – a request that was gleefully granted by the ultra-partisan FBI Director Kash Patel.
While the civil warrants are legal, they are only enforceable by state troopers within the State of Texas. It’s up to other states to decide if they want to cooperate with Texas – something that states run by Democrats will not do, particularly since there is no criminal issue at stake. Attempts to make this a federal issue should be laughed out of court – except that the final ruling there would come from the U.S. Supreme Court – a court that is also dominated by partisan Republicans. Federal law is what the U.S. Supreme Court says it is.
Finally, if it wasn’t crystal clear that Republican leaders in Texas are assholes:
- Paxton filed a lawsuit in a friendly Texas court (whose judge was appointed by Abbott) which quickly ruled that Texans are now barred from financially supporting their own Democratic representatives who left the state at their behest. The ruling is insane but will likely stand while any appeals languish in Republican-run Texas courts.
- Republican leadership in Texas is even looking to punish those in their own party who dared to vote to impeach Paxton for some laughably obvious crimes. GOP leaders are not just wanting to campaign against the wayward Republican incumbents; they want to deny them access to Republican primary ballots in the newly redrawn districts.
Democrats cannot donate money to support their current representatives while some Republicans will not be allowed to vote for their current representatives in the next election.
Democracy in Action.
While things will undoubtedly change shortly after I publish this post, the legal maneuvering and the media posturing will continue. However, well beyond the politics is a much larger question with respect to the adoption of the proposed map:
Is it right?
Well, of course it isn’t.
While Republicans are massively better than Democrats at gerrymandering, both parties have done it. I personally consider the current 25-12 split in Texas to be quite unfair, but I’d begrudgingly accepted it as a political reality. I similarly accepted that 42% of Texas voters earned exactly zero votes in the 2024 Electoral College. That said, the proposed 30-8 split of Texas seats in the U.S. House is a bridge way too far. There is no reality in which such a blatantly partisan power grab should be acceptable to anyone of any political persuasion who actually believes in the American concept of representative government. By any logical or moral measure, it simply isn’t right.
The founding fathers intended for the U.S. House to be the most democratic body in government, with voters represented by their neighbors who share local concerns. The extreme gerrymander proposed by Texas Republicans makes a mockery of the Constitution’s intent for the sole purpose of unearned political control. Since Republicans cannot guarantee their continued power based on their ideas and policies, they have resorted to the concepts and tactics of fascism to solidify their control.
Texas voters will no longer be choosing their Representatives. Texas Representatives will be choosing their voters.
This is how democracy dies.
[ A brief coda: This post took me a while. I kept having to pause to throw things across the room. After finally settling on this topic amongst the many examples of insanity around me, this issue is quite personal. While I have no problem ranting into the wind, I prefer to accompany my complaints with a possible course of action. Unfortunately, I have nothing. I can’t even recommend a place to send money. This sucks. I’m open to ideas if anyone has a clue. In the meantime, I need to throw something… ]