Court battle begins over California’s new congressional map designed to favor Democrats | EUROtoday

The battle over California’s new congressional map designed to assist Democrats flip congressional House seats will go to court docket Monday as a panel of federal judges considers whether or not the district boundaries accepted by voters final month can be utilized in elections.

The listening to in Los Angeles units the stage for a high-stakes authorized and political battle between the Trump administration and Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who’s been eyeing a 2028 presidential run. The lawsuit asks a three-judge panel to grant a short lived restraining order by Dec. 19 — the date candidates can take the primary official steps to run within the 2026 election.

Voters accepted California’s new U.S. House map in November via Proposition 50. It’s designed to assist Democrats flip as many as 5 congressional House seats within the midterm elections subsequent 12 months. It was Newsom’s response to a Republican-led effort in Texas backed by President Donald Trump.

The redistricting showdown between the nation’s two most populous states has unfold nationally, with efforts aiming to find out which occasion controls Congress for the second half of Trump’s time period. Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio have adopted new district strains that would present a partisan benefit.

Some plans are going through authorized challenges, however the Supreme Court dominated earlier this month to permit Texas to make use of its new map for the 2026 election. The Justice Department has solely sued California.

The U.S. Justice Department, becoming a member of a case introduced by the California Republican Party, has accused California of gerrymandering its map in violation of the Constitution through the use of race as an element to favor Hispanic voters. Republicans need the court docket to ban California from utilizing the brand new map. Voters accepted the map for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections. State Democrats mentioned they’re assured the lawsuit will fail.

“In letting Texas use its gerrymandered maps, the Supreme Court noted that California’s maps, like Texas’s, were drawn for lawful reasons,” Newsom’s spokesperson Brandon Richards mentioned in an announcement. “That should be the beginning and the end of this Republican effort to silence the voters of California.”

New U.S. House maps are drawn across the country after the Census every 10 years. Some states like California rely on an independent commission to draw maps, while others like Texas let politicians draw them. The effort to create new maps in the middle of the decade is highly unusual.

Paul Mitchell, a redistricting consultant who drew the map for Democrats, is expected to offer testimony. The Justice Department alleges that Mitchell and state leaders admitted that they redrew some districts to have a Latino majority.

The lawsuit cites a news release from state Democrats that says the new map “retains and expands Voting Rights Act districts that empower Latino voters” whereas making no modifications to Black majority districts within the Oakland and Los Angeles areas. The federal Voting Rights Act, handed within the Nineteen Sixties, units guidelines for drawing districts to make sure minority teams have sufficient political energy. The lawsuit additionally cites a Cal Poly Pomona and Caltech examine that concludes the brand new map would improve Latino voting energy.

“Race cannot be used as a proxy to advance political interests, but that is precisely what the California General Assembly did with Proposition 50 — the recent ballot initiative that junked California’s pre-existing electoral map in favor of a rush-job rejiggering of California’s congressional district lines,” the lawsuit mentioned.

House Democrats want to realize only a handful of seats subsequent 12 months to take management of the chamber, which might imperil Trump’s agenda for the rest of his time period and open the best way for congressional investigations into his administration. Republicans maintain 219 seats, to Democrats’ 214.