According to a U.S. Supreme Court decision, the new Texas congressional redistricting map can be used as legal challenges play out.
With the Dec. 8 candidate filing deadline just around the corner, the new map will be likely be used for the 2026 midterm elections. In restoring the new map, the Supreme Court ensured Republicans running for redrawn districts will get to campaign under the new lines in 2026.
In a concurring opinion, Justice Samuel Alito wrote, “Based on our preliminary evaluation of this case, Texas satisfies the traditional criteria for interim relief. Texas is likely to succeed on the merits of its claim that the District Court committed at least two serious errors.”
Additionally, Justice Alito added that while it was indisputable that the state's motivation for redistricting was to gain partisan advantage, he rejected the argument that Texas had engaged in racial gerrymandering.
The Court relied heavily on a recent precedent that requires challengers to offer their own version of a map. That map must show how the state could have achieved the same political goals without creating the racial patterns the challengers say are unconstitutional.
The plaintiffs did not submit such a map. The majority said that this omission strongly suggested that politics, not race, drove the design of the districts.
The Supreme Court said that courts must begin with the assumption that lawmakers acted properly. Ambiguous evidence should not be treated as proof of wrongdoing. The district court did the opposite and treated uncertain evidence as support for the challengers’ theory. The Supreme Court said this approach was incorrect.
The Court also stressed that the lower court waited too long to block the map since candidate filing had already begun, and counties were preparing ballots. Changing maps at this point would create confusion across the state. The Supreme Court said courts should avoid making such changes once an election cycle is underway.
This reasoning is based on a long-standing principle that discourages late-stage court intervention in election rules. For Texas, the immediate effect is that the 2026 elections will proceed under the new map. Candidates and voters will not face the disruption of switching back to the old map in the middle of the filing period.
Justice Alito ruled that while it was “indisputable that the state's motivation for redistricting was to gain partisan advantage, he rejected the argument that Texas had engaged in racial gerrymandering.
Democrats claim the new map is engineered to give Republicans control of 30 of the state’s 38 congressional districts, up from the 25 they currently hold under the 2021 map. Numerous GOP candidates have stepped up to run in the new districts, while several Democratic incumbents were pushed into nearby districts already occupied by another Democrat, forcing them to either retire or run in primaries.
The ruling temporarily paused a lower court ruling that had blocked the map from going into effect. On Nov. 18, two federal judges ruled the new map could not be used b the state engaged in gerrymandering. Galveston District Judge Jeffrey Brown authored the opinion ordering Texas to return to its 2021 map and 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Jerry Smith dissented.