Supreme Court Sides With Texas GOP in Major Redistricting Order

The U.S. Supreme Court, in a 6-3 vote, just issued an order staying an injunction against the state of Texas, allowing the newly drawn congressional map to proceed. This redistricting could result in five additional Republican House seats.

As reported by Fox News:

The Supreme Court signaled that Texas is likely to prevail in defending its new congressional map, faulting a lower court for misreading evidence and ignoring required legal inferences as the state races toward 2026 election deadlines.

In a brief order that keeps Gov. Greg Abbott’s redrawn districts in place for now, the court said the district court committed two major errors by failing to apply the presumption of legislative good faith when considering disputed evidence and by declining to draw a near-dispositive inference against challengers who offered no alternative map that met Texas’s partisan goals.

The stay is temporary while the merits proceed, yet Justice Elena Kagan warned in dissent that the ruling effectively locks in the contested boundaries for the 2026 midterms because of looming state deadlines.

“This Court’s eagerness to playact a district court here has serious consequences,” Kagan said. “The majority calls its ‘evaluation’ of this case ‘preliminary.’ The results, though, will be anything but.”

Essentially, Texas wanted to draw up a new congressional districting map for the state, and predictably, the Left got all worked up, arguing the map was racially discriminatory, and two lower courts agreed, granting an injunction against the state’s redistricting plans. So Texas filed an emergency application asking the U.S. Supreme Court to step in.

Last night, the Supreme Court granted a stay of the injunction, allowing Texas to use its new congressional map for the upcoming midterms. Not surprisingly, traditionally Left-friendly Justices Elena Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ketanji Brown Jackson – all three appointed by Democrats – dissented.

As a rapidly growing state, Texas gained new congressional seats based on the census. But on top of that, it attempted a mid-cycle redistricting – something states are entitled to do, though it’s less common. Its legislature passed a map that could theoretically add as many as five additional Republican seats.

So why did SCOTUS intervene? Well, for starters, the lower court made at least two serious errors: It didn’t honor the presumption of legislative good faith, meaning the district court essentially took ambiguous or circumstantial evidence and assumed the worst about the legislature. And the challengers didn’t provide a viable alternative map that met Texas’s valid objectives. And yet the district court still ruled against the state.

This stay likely covers the entire 2026 cycle because there simply isn’t enough time for the district court to litigate the case fully, issue a decision, and send it back up the chain.

The Supreme Court also emphasized a principle they’ve repeated again and again: It is not the place of the federal courts to be rewriting election rules on the eve of an election.

And that is exactly what the district court did, interfering directly with an active primary season, which the Justices said caused unnecessary confusion.

Today’s ruling also hints that the Supreme Court is signaling a more hands-off approach toward states in redistricting matters, as long as there isn’t clear racial discrimination. They appear less willing to let federal courts jump in and micromanage every map dispute, especially under the outdated assumptions of the 1960s and ’70s. And that cuts both ways, for red states and blue states.

Now Texas will likely get its five new Republican-leaning seats. And yes, don’t be surprised if California gets to keep its Prop 50-driven map. The political balance between the two evens out, but in both cases, it will be the states – not federal judges – who will hold the pen.

Regardless of how you feel, this is a major win for Texas today. And in a larger sense, it’s a win for state authority over redistricting. The Court is clearly pushing back on the idea that every partisan map equals racial discrimination, a distinction Justice Kagan seemed intent on trying to blur in her dissent, but which Justice Alito pointed out wasn’t supported by the evidence.

States draw maps. Parties in power draw maps to their advantage. That’s been true forever. And unless there’s explicit racial targeting, the Court seems to be saying that’s simply politics, not discrimination.

Today’s Sekulow broadcast included more analysis of the Supreme Court’s ruling and how it will likely affect upcoming elections. We also discussed new information in yesterday’s arrest of the J6 pipe bombing suspect after five years. And in a twist that’s raised eyebrows, investigators say the evidence they needed was already collected back in 2021 – but the Biden-era FBI never followed through.

Watch the full broadcast below: