In 2026, Democrats can take control of the U.S. House of Representatives by simply flipping three seats held by Republicans last year.
President Trump’s Texas redistricting plan sparks protests across the US
More than 300 people protested in Texas on Saturday against President Trump’s redistricting plan.
WASHINGTON, Nov 11 (Reuters) – A Utah judge has thrown out a new U.S. congressional map passed by the Republican-led Legislature in favor of an alternative plan likely to give Democrats back one of the state’s four House seats in next year’s midterm elections.
In a ruling late Monday night, District Judge Deanna Gibson said the congressional map is an “extreme partisan outlier” that illegally gives an advantage to Republicans. The plan developed by Republicans would split Salt Lake County, home to most of the state’s Democrats, in half.
Mr. Gibson chose one of two alternative maps proposed by voting rights groups that sued over the map, both of which would have created Democratic-leaning districts centered around Salt Lake County.
Her decision comes amid a nationwide battle over redistricting that began when Texas redrawn its congressional maps at the behest of President Donald Trump in an effort to flip five Democratic seats. California voters, by contrast, overwhelmingly approved the state’s new maps for five Republican incumbents last week.
Other Republican- and Democratic-led states have also created or are considering creating new maps. Manipulating district lines to benefit one political party, known as gerrymandering, is not new, but redistricting typically only happens once every 10 years, when the Constitution requires states to redistrict based on the decennial U.S. Census.
In 2026, Democrats can take control of the U.S. House of Representatives by simply flipping three seats held by Republicans last year.
In Utah, Mr. Gibson ordered lawmakers in August to draw new maps after finding that Republicans had illegally repealed a voter-approved referendum to establish an independent redistricting commission.
But she agreed with voting rights groups Monday that the resulting plan, backed by Republicans, remains gerrymandered and intolerable.
“Based on the evidence presented, the court finds that Map C was drawn to benefit the Republican Party,” she wrote.
Candice Pierucci, a Republican state representative who helped lead the legislative map, called the decision “a clear example of judicial activism” against X.
“This ruling is a victory for all Utahns who believe voters, not politicians, should decide who represents them,” Democratic U.S. Rep. Susan DelBene, chair of the party’s national legislative campaigns division, said in a statement.
