Trump Urges Redistricting as Tennessee Redistricting Special Session Starts Tuesday
The Tennessee redistricting special session starts Tuesday after the U.S. Supreme Court knocked out a major pillar of the Voting Rights Act on Wednesday. Lawmakers in several southern states are set to consider new congressional maps before the November elections, with Tennessee among the states moving first.
Trump and the House map push
President Donald Trump urged more states to join in redistricting on Sunday and said Republicans could gain 20 House seats in a social media post. He wrote, "We should demand that State Legislatures do what the Supreme Court says must be done."
The push is already moving beyond Tennessee. Special legislative sessions responding to the court ruling are to start Monday in Alabama, and Florida became the eighth state to enact new House districts ahead of the midterm elections on Monday.
Louisiana and Florida maps
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a redrawn map passed by lawmakers last week that could help Republicans win as many as four additional House seats. Louisiana lawmakers, who already are in session, are also looking at how to redraw their congressional districts.
The Supreme Court decision struck down a majority-Black congressional district in Louisiana and said the state relied too heavily on race when creating a second Black majority House district as it attempted to comply with the Voting Rights Act. Alanah Odoms, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, called the redistricting efforts "a wave of nefarious actions" on Monday.
Election math in five states
Republicans think they could gain as many as 13 seats from new congressional districts in five states, while Democrats think they could pick up as many as 10 seats from new districts adopted in three states. Legislative voting districts typically are redrawn only once a decade after a census, but the court ruling has accelerated the map fight before November.
That leaves Tennessee lawmakers with a fast-moving choice on Tuesday: whether to redraw the state’s House lines in a way that could feed the wider national push for more seats before voters go to the polls.
