Challengers to Texas’ newly redrawn congressional map urged the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday not to halt a lower court ruling that requires the state to use its previous map in next year’s elections, arguing the decision was issued with sufficient time before the 2026 cycle.
The filing marks the latest development in a rapidly moving dispute over whether Texas may implement a new map that targets five Democratic-held House seats in the upcoming midterms, Roll Call reported.
Texas officials are appealing a 2–1 ruling from a federal district court panel that found the state’s 2024 map to be an illegal racial gerrymander and ordered the state to revert to the congressional boundaries adopted in 2021 following the 2020 census.
In an emergency application, the state asked the Supreme Court to intervene by next Monday, contending the lower court’s order came too close to Texas’ Dec. 8 candidate filing deadline.
“The chaos caused by such an injunction is obvious: campaigning had already begun, candidates had already gathered signatures and filed applications to appear on the ballot under the 2025 map, and early voting for the March 3, 2026, primary was only 91 days away,” the petition said.
The complainants in the filing on Monday contended that continuing to use the map the state has utilized for the past four years would result in “less work and less confusion” compared to implementing a new one that has already been deemed unlawful by a court order.
“No one will be confused by using the map that has governed Texas’s congressional elections for the past four years,” the response said.
The challengers also defended the lower court ruling and called the new Texas map “as stark a case of racial gerrymandering as one can imagine.” The challengers argued that even though the state drew the map to gain a partisan advantage — targeting five seats held by Democrats — the state also discriminated against minority voters in the process.
Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. issued an administrative stay on Friday, temporarily pausing the lower court’s ruling while the Supreme Court considers whether Texas may use its newly redrawn 2025 congressional map.
The Court’s decision is expected to have implications for the upcoming midterm elections, as states controlled by both parties continue to use redistricting to bolster their political positions in the U.S. House.
Because of the procedural posture of the case, the dispute is subject to direct appeal to the Supreme Court, positioning it for a potential preliminary ruling as early as later this week, Roll Call noted.
In the 2–1 lower court decision, the majority concluded that the Texas Legislature had targeted districts with significant numbers of minority voters for alterations and relied explicitly on those considerations when drawing the map, a finding the state vehemently denies.
The Trump administration filed a brief on Monday urging the Supreme Court to side with Texas, arguing that the challengers had not met the “heavy burden” required to show that the Legislature acted with racial intent.
“The United States has a strong interest in protecting citizens from race discrimination in voting, and it has an equally strong interest in ensuring that federal courts do not erroneously interfere with federal elections and usurp the constitutional primacy of States in the drawing of congressional districts,” the brief said.
The Trump administration argued that the lower court “misused” a Justice Department letter sent to Texas, which had advised state officials that several districts needed to be adjusted to comply with the Voting Rights Act. The administration also contended that the ruling was issued too close to the state’s initial election deadlines.
The Texas Legislature approved the new congressional map in August. Plaintiffs in an ongoing lawsuit alleging Voting Rights Act violations in the state’s original post-2020 census map subsequently added the revised map to their challenge, said the outlet.
Since then, California, Virginia, Missouri, North Carolina, and Kansas have either approved new congressional maps or begun the process of drafting them.