Trump-backed redistricting effort fails as Democrats win House majority

Republicans in eight states redrew the boundaries of dozens of congressional districts over the past year at President Donald Trump's urging, hoping to protect a slim House majority in the midterm elections. The effort ultimately failed.

Democrats won most of the Republican-targeted seats and others Republicans had expected to keep. A Democratic surge driven by voter dissatisfaction with Trump, the economy and the war with Iran swept Republicans out of power.

“This is a catastrophic rebuke of Donald Trump's failed effort to gerrymander the country into oblivion to save the U.S. House of Representatives for himself.”

The redistricting plan failed in Alabama, Florida and Texas. Courts blocked it in Missouri, and voters firmly rejected it on Tuesday. In California, Democratic redistricting flipped all five Republican-held seats it targeted.

Former Attorney General Eric Holder, chair of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, said the Trump redistricting plan was systematically dismantled and that voters chose a new Democratic majority. John Bisognano, the committee's president, called the result a catastrophic rebuke of Trump's failed gerrymandering effort.

Congressional districts are normally redrawn after each decade's census, but Trump prompted an unusual mid-decade battle last year. He urged Texas Republicans to reshape House districts to give the GOP a chance at winning five additional seats.

Republicans hoped to gain as many as four seats in Florida, two in Ohio, and one each in Alabama, Louisiana, North Carolina and Tennessee. In all but one of the revamped districts, Trump would have carried over 54 percent of the vote had the maps been in place for the 2024 election, according to Associated Press estimates.

Justin Levitt, a Loyola Law School professor who runs the All About Redistricting website, said such districts are normally relatively safe.