Trump’s redistricting push gains steam in another key state: ‘We will stand with the president’

Republican leaders in North Carolina’s GOP-dominated legislature say they’ll vote next week to redraw the state’s congressional district map as part of President Donald Trump’s nationwide effort to create more right-leaning House seats ahead of next year’s midterm elections.

When state lawmakers in the key southeastern battleground meet in special session next Monday, they’ll become the latest state to jump into the high-stakes political battle over congressional redistricting, pitting Trump and the GOP against the Democrats.

Republican lawmakers in North Carolina are aiming to follow in the footsteps of Republican-controlled Texas and Missouri, which passed new congressional maps the past two months. 

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The moves are part of a broad effort by the GOP to pad its razor-thin House majority to keep control of the chamber in the 2026 midterms when the party in power traditionally faces political headwinds and loses seats. Democrats need a pickup of just three seats to win back control of the House.

Trump and his political team are aiming to prevent what happened during his first term in the White House when Democrats reclaimed the House majority in the 2018 midterm elections.

“We will stand with the president, defend the GOP majority, and secure an additional Republican congressional seat,” Republican North Carolina House Speaker Destin Hall said Monday.

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North Carolina’s congressional delegation was split 7-7 between Democrats and Republicans until GOP state lawmakers created a new map two years ago that allowed Republicans to capture 10 of the state’s 14 congressional districts in last year’s elections.

The latest new map Republicans aim to pass in the state legislature will likely target Democratic Rep. Ron Davis, whose district is the only one left in North Carolina that’s considered a true swing seat.

Trump narrowly carried North Carolina in his 2016 presidential election victory, his 2020 re-election defeat, and his 2024 recapturing of the White House.

Hall said that the president “earned a clear mandate from the voters of North Carolina and the rest of the country, and we intend to defend it by drawing an additional Republican Congressional seat.”

But North Carolina House Democratic leader Robert Reives charged that Republicans in the legislature “are stealing a congressional district in order to shield themselves from accountability at the ballot box.”

And Democratic Gov. Josh Stein highlighted in a statement that “the General Assembly works for North Carolina, not Donald Trump.”

“These shameless politicians are abusing their power to take away yours. I will always fight for you because the voters should choose their representatives, not the other way around,” the governor added as he pointed to Republican state lawmakers.

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But the redistricting map that will likely be passed by the GOP-dominated legislature next week won’t be subject to a veto by the governor.

Democrats are trying to fight back across the country.

California state lawmakers approved a special ballot proposition this November to obtain voter approval to temporarily sidetrack the state’s nonpartisan redistricting commission and return the power to draw the congressional maps to the Democrat-dominated legislature.

The effort in California, which aims to create five more Democratic-leaning congressional districts and counter the shift of up to five seats in Texas, is being spearheaded by two-term Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is seen as a likely 2028 Democratic presidential contender.

And Democrats in heavily blue Maryland and Illinois are weighing redistricting.

Even before Trump initiated his redistricting push, Ohio was under court order to redraw its maps. That could boost Republicans in a one-time battleground state that now leans right.

And Republicans in the GOP-dominated states of Indiana, Florida, and Nebraska are also mulling congressional redistricting.

Meanwhile, Democrats could pick up a seat in Republican-dominated Utah. This, after the state legislature drew new maps after a judicial ruling that lawmakers four years ago ignored an independent commission approved by voters to prevent partisan gerrymandering.