Estimated Time to Read: 9 minutes
*This article was updated after publication to include an analysis of the dissenting opinion.
On November 18, 2025, a three-judge panel in El Paso issued a preliminary injunction barring Texas from using its newly adopted 2025 congressional map in the upcoming 2026 elections. The panel, in a two-to-one decision, ordered that elections proceed under the 2021 map, citing violations of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments. The court found that race, not merely partisanship, was the predominant factor in how the new map was drawn.
Texas Policy Research maintained a neutral position on the 2025 redistricting legislation during its consideration by lawmakers, recognizing that redistricting is a fundamentally political exercise with high constitutional stakes but not one driven by core policy merits.
Writing for the majority, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Brown stated that although politics did play a role, the evidence showed that Texas had engaged in racial gerrymandering. The 2025 map, passed in August during a special legislative session, was widely viewed as designed to create five additional Republican-leaning districts.
What Triggered the Mid-Decade Redistricting?
At the heart of the redistricting effort was a letter sent by the U.S. Department of Justice on July 7, 2025, warning Texas that four congressional districts- TX-09, TX-18, TX-29, and TX-33- were impermissible “coalition districts” following the Fifth Circuit’s 2024 ruling in Petteway v. Galveston County. Within 48 hours, Governor Greg Abbott (R) expanded the legislative agenda to include redistricting and instructed lawmakers to redraw the map to address the DOJ’s concerns.
In floor debate during the second special session, State Sen. Phil King (R-Weatherford), who chaired the Senate’s redistricting committee, made clear that the stakes were not just legal but national. He stated, “I’m convinced that if Texas does not take this action, there is an extreme risk that the Republican majority will be lost. If it does, the next two years after the midterm, there will be nothing but inquisitions and impeachments and humiliation for our country.” His remarks reflected the political urgency driving the mid-cycle map redraw and connected the effort to a broader national Republican strategy.
However, the court found that Texas interpreted the DOJ’s letter not just as a permissive warning but as a directive, and acted accordingly. Judge Brown noted that the state’s redistricting process used precise racial targets to configure districts, often with just over 50 percent of a single racial demographic, signaling that race, not traditional districting factors, was the driving force.
Legal Findings: Race Over Politics = Constitutional Violation
The majority of the three-judge panel concluded that race, not partisanship, was the predominant factor in the drawing of several congressional districts, including TX-16, TX-23, and TX-29. The judges emphasized that these districts were configured to meet precise racial demographic targets, such as 50.3 percent Hispanic or 50.5 percent Black. These “bare-majority” constructions were not incidental, the court found, but rather intentional signals that the Legislature had subordinated traditional districting criteria to racial considerations. Under existing Supreme Court precedent, when race is the dominant motive in redistricting, strict scrutiny applies, and such maps must be narrowly tailored to survive constitutional review, a standard the court found Texas did not meet.
The court’s conclusion that the 2025 map constituted racial gerrymandering led to its decision to enjoin its use and reinstate the 2021 map for the 2026 election cycle. The majority acknowledged that partisan goals were part of the redistricting process but concluded that they were not the controlling rationale. This distinction between race and politics is constitutionally significant: while partisan gerrymandering is generally permissible under current Supreme Court doctrine, racial gerrymandering is not.
In a sharply worded dissent, Judge Jerry E. Smith rejected the majority’s conclusions both on the law and on the process. He argued that the plaintiffs had not met the burden required to prove that race predominated over political motivations. Smith characterized the map as a political document and emphasized that political motivations, even those intended to entrench a party’s power, are not constitutionally suspect under current law. What set his dissent apart was not just the legal critique but the depth of his frustration with the court’s conduct. He wrote, “In my 37 years on the federal bench, this is the most outrageous conduct by a judge that I have ever encountered in a case in which I have been involved.” Smith condemned what he saw as judicial overreach, accusing the court of micromanaging the redistricting process based on ambiguous and circumstantial evidence. He further warned that enjoining the map so close to the election risked confusion and instability, and he aligned his position with the Purcell Principle, which cautions against judicial changes to election law during an active electoral cycle.
Together, the majority opinion and the dissent lay bare not only the legal complexities of the case, but also the deep internal divisions within the judiciary over how far courts should go in scrutinizing legislative motives and intervening in the redistricting process.
Political Fallout: Campaigns in Disarray
The injunction was issued just ten days after the opening of Texas’s candidate filing period for the 2026 primaries. Dozens of candidates, many of them Republicans, had already filed to run in newly redrawn districts. The decision instantly scrambled the electoral landscape, reviving districts that some candidates had abandoned and eliminating newly created ones.
Democrats who had been pushed into difficult primaries or were considering retirement under the 2025 map were now returning to safer, familiar districts. Republicans who had entered the race expecting to benefit from favorable new lines suddenly found themselves without viable paths to election. The ruling triggered immediate shifts in strategy, endorsements, and campaign infrastructure.
Reactions from the Parties
Republican leaders sharply criticized the ruling. Governor Greg Abbott released a statement saying the Legislature redrew the maps to better reflect Texans’ conservative voting preferences and for no other reason. He called the idea that the maps were discriminatory absurd and said the ruling undermined the constitutional authority of the Texas Legislature by allowing federal judges to impose their own map. He confirmed that Texas would swiftly appeal to the Supreme Court.
Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) echoed that sentiment in a formal statement, declaring that the radical left was once again trying to undermine the will of the people. He defended what he referred to as the “Big Beautiful Map” as legal and passed for valid partisan purposes. Paxton accused Democrats in states like California, Illinois, and New York of eliminating Republican representation through gerrymandering, and said that when Republicans respond in kind, Democrats cry racism. He vowed to defend the map before the Supreme Court and expressed confidence that the justices would uphold Texas’s sovereign right to engage in partisan redistricting.
State Representative Cody Vasut (R-Angleton), who chaired the House Redistricting Committee in 2025, stated that he respectfully disagreed with the panel’s decision to give Democrats five more congressional seats. He expressed hope that the Supreme Court would stay the decision quickly, restoring what he called a more level playing field for 2026.
Democrats, by contrast, hailed the ruling. State Rep. Gene Wu (Houston) called the court’s action a rejection of one of the most brazen attempts to silence Texas voters. Congressman Greg Casar (Austin) stated that the maps were clearly illegal and said he would seek reelection in his current district under the restored 2021 lines. Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia (Houston) said she was elated and hopeful that the Supreme Court would affirm the lower court’s decision.
Supreme Court Appeal and the Purcell Principle
Texas has already filed a notice of appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, invoking 28 U.S.C. § 1253, which allows for direct appeals from three-judge district court rulings in redistricting cases. The state is also requesting an emergency stay of the lower court’s injunction to allow the 2025 map to remain in place for the 2026 election cycle.
The Court may weigh the appeal through the lens of the “Purcell Principle,” a doctrine warning courts not to alter election rules close to an election due to the risk of voter confusion. With Texas’s filing deadline for candidates set to close on December 8, the justices are expected to issue a decision quickly. That ruling could determine not just the 2026 map, but the legal boundary between permissible partisanship and impermissible racial gerrymandering.
How the DOJ Letter Backfired and May Have Sunk the Map
The most ironic and legally significant factor in the case may be the DOJ’s July 7 letter itself. Although intended to pressure Texas to comply with recent court precedent, the DOJ’s communication interpreted Petteway v. Galveston County far more aggressively than the ruling actually dictated.
Petteway held that Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act no longer requires jurisdictions to draw coalition districts combining multiple racial groups. However, the DOJ treated the decision as a mandate to dismantle them, asserting that the existing districts were unconstitutional racial gerrymanders and demanding they be eliminated. That shift from permissive law to mandatory directive misrepresented the actual legal standard.
By invoking race so explicitly and pressuring Texas to redraw four specific districts, the DOJ provided the very evidence the court would later use to determine that race, rather than political intent or traditional criteria, was the predominant factor. Public statements by Governor Abbott and legislative leaders citing the DOJ letter as the reason for redistricting confirmed that the Legislature had prioritized racial targets, including “on-the-nose” majorities just over 50 percent, in violation of constitutional standards.
In seeking to prompt compliance, the DOJ inadvertently supplied the foundation for the court’s conclusion that Texas engaged in racial gerrymandering. The episode now stands as a case study in how federal intervention, poorly timed and ambiguously framed, can backfire in redistricting litigation.
Final Thoughts
This case is about more than just one state’s congressional map. It illustrates the legal complexity, political sensitivity, and high stakes involved in redistricting when race, partisanship, and federal oversight intersect. The court’s injunction has disrupted campaigns, revived dormant districts, and drawn battle lines for an urgent appeal to the nation’s highest court.
As the Supreme Court considers whether to intervene, candidates, voters, and legal scholars across the country are watching closely. The outcome may decide not only how Texas votes in 2026, but how the Constitution balances race and politics for years to come.
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