How gerrymandering became a blood sport

0:00President Trump is quite explicit about what's happening in Texas. Just a very simple redrawing. We pick up five C's. The we here is Republicans, and he's talking about gerrymandering. He wants Republicans in the Texas legislature to redraw the state's congressional district so that they're more favorable to Republicans. And when he talked to reporters about this a few weeks ago, Trump suggested that Texas was just the beginning. And there could be some other states. We're going to get another three or four or five in addition. Trump can be this transparent because there are no federal restrictions on redrawing districts for purely partisan gain.

0:35The Supreme Court said so in 2019. And district boundaries have enormous consequences. These five seats could easily decide which party controls the House in 2026. So Democrats are playing every card they have. At the state level, Texas Democrats have fled the state in an effort to block the vote. Here's State Representative Gina Inajosa talking to NPR on Monday. It is undemocratic. It is anti the foundations of our country. And it is extreme and harmful to our constituents. So we will do everything in our power to fight it. You can hear their unappeal for fairness. Democrats in other states are also fighting the Texas plan, but they're using the language of power.

1:20I'm tired of fighting this fight with my hand tied behind my back. With all due respect to the good government groups, politics is a political process. That's New York Governor Kathy Hochul speaking on Monday. She said she supports disbanding or changing her state's independent redistricting commission. It's meant to ensure congressional maps are drawn fairly. Other states don't have the same aspirations that we always have had. And I hold those dear. But I cannot ignore that this, the playing field has changed dramatically. And shame on us if we ignore that fact and cling tight to the messages of the past.

2:02That era is over. Donald Trump eliminated that forever. Consider this. Gerrymandering has been part of U.S. politics for hundreds of years. How did it become a blood sport? From NPR, I'm Ari Shapiro.

2:27It's Consider This from NPR. Fights over congressional maps never used to be this intense. Texas Republicans just voted to issue civil arrest warrants for Democrats who fled the state. The GOP is trying to redraw House districts, and Democratic governors say they might follow the same path. David Wasserman of the Cook Political Report has called this a nuclear arms race for House control. Good to have you here. Thanks for having me. So start with that phrase, nuclear arms race. What do you mean by that? Well, given the margin in the House, which is it couldn't be hardly any tighter than it is, every party is clawing for every advantage that they can get from state to state.

3:07And Republicans, knowing that 2026 could be a tough year, are trying to layer sandbags to protect their House majority from a rising blue swell. So obviously, Texas alone, if it gives Republicans five extra seats, could determine control of the House. But if this is a nuclear arms race that does ripple out to lots of other states, what could the overall impact be? It depends on how each state shakes out. And it would seem as if the logical endpoint of this arms race would be the eradication of red state Democrats and blue state Republicans. California, under Governor Gavin Newsom, is threatening to retaliate by setting up an amendment, a ballot initiative that voters could approve this fall.

3:55There are very limited opportunities for Democrats to retaliate in other states beyond California. What we know, though, is that Democrats will still have a chance to win control of the House in 2026, even if Republicans add three to five additional seats in Texas to an Ohio, given the president's low approval rating and what we know historically about midterm elections. You mentioned that California has an independent redistricting commission, which is supposed to avoid partisan gerrymandering. New York has a similar commission, which Governor Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, is talking about possibly getting rid of.

4:35What happened to the movement to make this an independent, nonpartisan process? Predominantly, it was blue states that embraced redistricting reform in the last few decades and implemented independent and bipartisan commissions. What Democrats have realized is that they are playing with one hand tied behind their back, particularly when Texas is willing to attempt something this brazen. Of course, given how few competitive seats there are across the country, Democrats, They really have no choice but to try and retaliate, to squeeze the maximal number of seats out of the states that they control.

5:18And that means trying to step on some of the reforms that voters have approved. So do you think this nuclear arms race for House control is inevitably just going to keep barreling forward? Or is there any chance of an off-ramp or a truce or some kind of pause in the arms race? One of the reasons why it's not as simple as every state just pursuing a maximal gerrymander is that the criteria and the provisions for redrawing boundaries vary a lot from state to state. Each state has its unique redistricting culture, and both parties are seeking to get around provisions that are designed to ensure compactness or the integrity of communities of interest in order to offset what the other party is doing.

6:14We haven't even talked about Florida, where it's possible Republicans could increase their advantage over what they were able to pass in 2022 if Governor DeSantis were to pursue that. But overall, the U.S. Supreme Court and Congress have failed to reign in gerrymandering. The Supreme Court has ruled that partisan gerrymandering claims can't be brought in federal courts because it is fundamentally a political matter and there's no clear standard for what constitutes gerrymandering or not. And the power of the cartographers, the line drawers, who are partisans in most cases, has only been magnified by American voters self-sorting into heavily red and blue communities.

7:02And when Americans increasingly live in places where they're surrounded by people who share their political and cultural values, it's easier for partisan mapmakers to then segregate them into heavily red or blue districts to achieve their partisan aims. So what are you looking for in the next few months as we lead up towards the 2026 election season? Well, we'll be watching to see how several of these states shake out. It's probable that Texas Republicans are going to get their way at the end of the day. And the question then becomes, do Governor Newsom and Democrats in California retaliate? Are they able to convince voters to set aside the reform that they overwhelmingly passed in 2010 to go after what Republicans in Texas and what President Trump are seeking to do to protect their House majority?

7:56And when it is framed in terms of taking the fight to Donald Trump, California voters will probably get behind that, even though they have concerns that they've expressed at the polls in the past about aggressive partisan gerrymandering. That's Dave Wasserman, senior editor and political analyst for The Cook Political Report. Thanks so much. Thanks, Ari. This episode was produced by Mallory Yu and Connor Donovan. It was edited by Courtney Dorning. Our executive producer is Sammy Yenigan.

8:37It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Ari Shapiro.