Supreme Court hands GOP a redistricting win by striking down lower court block on Texas map

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TheSupreme Courthanded down a victory for the Republican Party on Monday, striking down a lower court’s ruling that had blocked Texas’ plans for redrawing its congressional districts.

The court hung its order on reasoning from a previous ruling in Abbott v.League of United Latin American Citizens but did not elaborate.The three liberal justices, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented.

The decision comes after the Supreme Court temporarilygreenlitthe state’s map in December and California’s map in February.Both states spearheaded the mid-cycle redistricting fights that have now been cropping up across the country.The high court’s approval of both states’ maps, giving Republicans and Democrats five-seat advantages, respectively, served to cancel each other’s efforts out ahead of the 2026 midterms.

DOJ BACKS TEXAS IN SUPREME COURT FIGHT OVER REPUBLICAN-DRAWN MAP

Gov. Greg Abbott gives a thumbs up while on stage at the RNC.

Gov.Greg Abbott, R-Texas, during the Republican National Convention (RNC) at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee on July 17, 2024.(David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Texas Gov.Greg Abbott, a Republican, had asked the Supreme Court last year to pause a three-judge panel’s ruling in the Western District of Texas that found 2-1 that race was too much of a factor in its redraw and that the state had improperly attempted to pack Latino and Black voters into new districts.

The Department of Justice also chimed in, telling the high court to intervene and reverse the lower court decision, saying Texas’ choice to change its map was driven by purely “partisan objectives,” not racial objectives, which could violate the Voting Rights Act.

The voting and immigrant rights groups who challengedTexasand Abbott claimed that the map was an illegal racial gerrymander.

The high court granted a 6-3 temporary stay in December, finding in an unsigned order that the groups had committed “at least two serious errors,” including that they did not extend the Texas legislature the “presumption of legislative good faith.” Monday’s decision by the Supreme Court to summarily reverse the lower court decision keeps the new Texas map alive indefinitely.

REAGAN-APPOINTED JUDGE TORCHES COLLEAGUES IN TEXAS MAP FIGHT

People gather outside of Supreme Court building in Washington

The Supreme Court is seen on Friday, Feb.20, 2026. (Annabelle Gordon/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

State Sen.Phil King displays a map during a Special Committee on Congressional Redistricting public testimony hearing on Aug.7, 2025, in Austin, Texas.(Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

The second error, the justices said, was that the groups did not offer an alternative map that served Texas’ stated political needs.

The high court said in the December order that the lower court should also not have “interfered with an active primary campaign, causing much confusion and upsetting the delicate federal-state balance in elections.”

In the dissent, Justice Elena Kagan, anObama appointee, criticized the conservative majority for its “eagerness to playact a district court.”

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