Red State Wins Massive Supreme Court Victory On Redistricting

The Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that Texas could forge ahead with its newly redrawn congressional map ahead of the 2026 midterm elections.

The initial order was unsigned, and declared that the lower court’s decision to block the map — which favors Republicans — had been made in error. A brief concurring opinion followed that was joined by Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch. Justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ketanji Brown-Jackson joined together in dissent.

The order opened with a brief explanation, noting that a three-judge District Court had granted the League of Latin American Voters’ request for an injunction — which would have prevented the state from implementing the new map — and stated that the Court intended to stay the injunction, as requested by the state of Texas. “The District Court failed to honor the presumption of legislative good faith by construing ambiguous direct and circumstantial evidence against the legislature,” the explanation read, in part.

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Justice Alito, in his concurring opinion, argued that the lower court’s determination — that the Republican-drawn map was based on race rather than politics — was made in error. He wrote that it was “indisputable” that the “impetus for the adoption of the Texas map (like the map subsequently adopted in California) was partisan advantage pure and simple” — and that being the case, the state should be permitted to move forward with that map. Thomas and Gorsuch agreed.

“When the asserted reason for a map is political, it is critical for challengers to produce an alternative map that serves the State’s allegedly partisan aim just as well as the map the State adopted. Id., at 34; Easley v. Cromartie, 532 U. S. 234, 258 (2001). Although respondents’ experts could have easily produced such a map if that were possible, they did not, giving rise to a strong inference that the State’s map was indeed based on partisanship, not race,” their concurring opinion continued.

Justice Kagan, in her lengthy dissent, complained that the ruling had declared the redrawn maps to not be based on race, as the lower court had found, but had instead justified them being drawn for political reasons.

The ruling, she said, “disserves the millions of Texans whom the District Court found were assigned to their new districts based on their race.”