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Welcome to The Logoff: After a major Supreme Court decision, President Donald Trump is pushing Republicans to redistrict even more aggressively.
What’s happening? On Thursday, Trump said in a post that Tennessee’s governor would “work hard to correct” the state’s congressional map in order to “give us one extra seat” in Congress.
It’s the latest sign that, following the new Supreme Court opinion, Republicans will try to pick up even more seats ahead of the 2026 midterms by further gerrymandering multiple different states, including Tennessee, Louisiana, and Florida.
What’s the context? On Wednesday, the Court ruled 6-3 in Louisiana v. Callais to strike down a provision of the Voting Rights Act banning racial gerrymandering.
As my colleague Ian Millhiser explained, the upshot of the ruling isn’t just that the Court’s six conservative justices have further weakened the Voting Rights Act; the decision is a full-throated endorsement of the most aggressive gerrymandering schemes possible, and Republican politicians — including Trump — are taking note.
How did this start? Trump is also the one who kicked all of this off last year, when his White House decided to pressure Texas into a rare mid-decade redistricting scheme. Texas successfully created about five more Republican seats in the US House — probably — by redrawing its maps, but in the process, launched a wider war.
How’s the math looking? Until recently, it seemed like the redistricting wars could have backfired on Republicans, or at best ended with a stalemate. Earlier this month, Virginia voters approved a referendum to draw new maps creating four additional Democratic seats, giving the party a slight edge nationally.
Since then, however, Florida has gotten involved; earlier this week, its legislature passed new maps netting four new Republican seats. On Thursday, Louisiana also suspended its about-to-begin congressional primaries to give it time to redraw its maps in response to the Callais decision. And if Tennessee Republicans make good on Trump’s post, the party could net another seat too.
And with that, it’s time to log off…
Hi readers — if you, like me, happen to live in Washington, DC, I have some fairly specific good news for you. Today, the sun will set at 8 pm here for the first time this year, and we won’t get a sunset earlier than 8 pm again until August. With that in mind, let’s go log off and enjoy some sunshine — we’ll see you back here in May (which is, somehow, tomorrow).
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