California Republicans strike out in challenge to new congressional map

LOS ANGELES (CN) — A three-judge panel on Wednesday denied a bid by the California Republican Party to block implementation of the state’s new voter-approved congressional district map that gives Democrats five additional seats in the U.S. House of Representatives to the detriment of Republican incumbents.

The Republicans, joined by the Trump administration, claimed the new map had been the result of unlawful racial gerrymandering, whereas California defended it as straightforward political gerrymandering in response to Texas redrawing its congressional map, at President Donald Trump’s behest, to hand Republicans five more seats in the House and preserve the party’s slim majority at next year’s midterm election.

In a 2-1 decision, the panel rejected the argument that the map somehow was based on improper racial considerations rather than the widely publicized reaction to Texas’ overhaul of its congressional districts.

“The record contains a mountain of statements reflecting the partisan goals of Proposition 50, from which challengers have culled a molehill of statements showing race consciousness on the part of the mapmaker and certain legislators,” U.S. District Judge Josephine Staton, a Barack Obama appointee, wrote for the majority. “But that is not enough to make the necessary showing that the relevant decisionmakers — here, the electorate — enacted the new map for racial reasons.”

Racial gerrymandering, where race is the predominant incentive in creating voting districts, is largely unconstitutional unless there are compelling reasons under the U.S. Voting Rights Act to ensure minority groups are able to elect representatives of their choice.

The U.S. Supreme Court, on the other hand, has washed its hands of partisan gerrymandering disputes, meaning states are free to create voting maps that benefit the party that controls a state’s legislature.

U.S. District Judge Wesley Hsu, a Joe Biden appointee, joined Staton’s opinion.

U.S. Circuit Judge Kenneth Kiyul Lee, a Donald Trump appointee, dissented and said comments by Paul Mitchell, the mapmaker hired by the California legislators, last year indicated that race played a role in reconfiguring the congressional districts.

California Governor Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who had championed the new map to counteract Trump’s efforts to retain a Republican majority in the House of Representatives, welcomed the ruling.

“Republicans’ weak attempt to silence voters failed," Newsom said in a statement. “California voters overwhelmingly supported Prop 50 — to respond to Trump’s rigging in Texas — and that is exactly what this court concluded.”

Attorneys who brought the lawsuit on behalf of the California Republican Party didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the decision.

The trio of judges last month heard three days of testimony and argument in Los Angeles federal court on the question of whether the mapmaker hired by California lawmakers had been seeking to bolster to Hispanic vote rather than the Democratic vote.

On the last day of the hearing, the judges showed their colors, with Staton and Hsu expressing incredulity at the Republican argument that the voters had voted for a racial overhaul of the congressional districts even though the campaign by Proposition 50 supporters and opponents had only focused on what Republicans called a Democratic “power grab.”

Lee, on the other hand, disparaged California’s lawmakers for evoking their legislative privilege to avoid answering questions about what motivated the creation of the new map, as well as Mitchell for not testifying at the hearing about his intentions.

Much of the testimony during the evidentiary hearing focused on the new borders of Congressional District 13 in the California Central Valley. That district was considered a “purple” swing district but, under the new map, is more solidly Democratic.

The California Republicans, however, argued that race was the deciding factor on how the new district lines were drawn because it added areas of Stockton that, they claim, were strongly Hispanic while ignoring neighboring areas with many Democratic voters.

They also cited comments from state lawmakers and the mapmaker they had employed to redraw the voting districts that, according to the plaintiffs, revealed the true intention behind the new map was to strengthen the Hispanic vote.

In response, California and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee presented evidence that the border of that District 13 was determined to avoid removing too many Democratic votes from the neighboring District 9 and, as such, make that district more vulnerable for the Democratic incumbent.

A redistricting expert for the state told the judges that the new map used the trusted partisan gerrymandering tools of “cracking” and “packing” to remove Republican voters from five of the currently Republican congressional districts and concentrate them in the four remaining ones.

The losing side is more than likely to ask the Supreme Court to weigh in. That court in December reversed the decision by a panel of three judges that had sided with civil rights groups in finding that the new Texas map was likely to be the result of unlawful racial gerrymandering by majority-non-white districts and couldn’t be used in the 2026 election.

Over the dissents of the three liberal justices, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority reprimanded the panel for throwing out Texas’ newly minted map “on the eve of an election.”

“The district court improperly inserted itself into an active primary campaign, causing much confusion and upsetting the delicate federal-state balance in elections,” the court wrote in an unsigned order.

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