North Carolina Republicans Tuesday passed a new congressional redistricting map aimed at flipping one Democratic seat and giving President Trump’s allies a boost in the 2026 midterms.
The GOP-held state senate rubber-stamped the new map that would make it much tougher for Democratic Rep. Don Davis to win reelection in his rural swing district.
The state House, also controlled by Republicans, was expected to follow suit, likely later in the day or Wednesday.
Democratic Gov. Josh Stein does not have the power to veto redistricting measures in the Tarheel State, meaning a lawsuit would be the only way to delay or block the unusual mid-decade plan.
North Carolina is virtually a toss-up on the statewide level between the two parties, but Republicans hold near supermajorities in both state houses due to their ability to gerrymander the district lines.
A court-ordered map split the state’s congressional delegation 7-7 in 2022, but Republican lawmakers redrew it to give the GOP a 10-4 edge in 2024. The new map would flip one of the four Democratic seats, making the split 11-3.
The North Carolina move marks the latest effort by red states to comply with Trump’s unprecedented demand for new maps in the middle of the decade that could give Republicans a better chance at hanging onto both houses of Congress next year in what is shaping up as a difficult political environment.
Republicans hold just a narrow six-vote margin, so Democrats would need to flip only a handful of seats to retake control.
Texas has already passed a map that will likely add five GOP seats and Missouri has added one. Several other red states including Indiana and Ohio are poised to follow suit.
It’s trickier for Democrats to respond in kind because many blue states like New York have independent commissions designed to produce fairer maps within their states.
California voters may pass a referendum suspending the state’s commission, a move that would clear the way for new maps that could flip five GOP seats to Democrats.
Illinois and Maryland are mulling plans to pick off one GOP-held seat in each state.
Another wildcard is the conservative Supreme Court, which is considering whether to further gut the Voting Rights Act. If it does, Republicans across the South could redraw maps to eliminate about a dozen districts designed to favor Black Democrats.
