GOP, Democrats Battle Over Texas Redistricting Ahead of 2026

The visit to Austin last week by U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, which included both a private meeting with legislative Democrats and a news conference to call even more attention to the Republican-led redrawing of the Texas congressional map, is a sign that the state is in play for the 2026 election cycle.

But not necessarily in the context of what "in play" generally means in political discourse.

What Jeffries’ trip shows — triggered by the Trump administration’s push to toss out congressional districts drawn in 2021— is that Texas Democrats are not without influence in Washington. That influence is not diminished; in fact, it could spell trouble for Republicans on the national stage.

Anyone paying attention to Texas politics already knows that Republicans are trying to add five additional winnable seats in Texas, and that they have the votes in the Legislature to do just that. And it goes without saying that those new seats could help Republicans withstand a backlash in the 2026 midterm elections, which historically go badly for the party in the White House.

Democrats need to flip only two seats next year to gain control of the U.S. House, which would likely lead to the election of Jeffries, a New York Democrat, as speaker. Under the present map, Jeffries could count on 13 Democratic votes (including the expected win in a special election this November for the seat vacated by the death of U.S. Rep. Sylvester Turner of Houston).

But if five of those seats were somehow out of reach for Democrats, Jeffries' path to the head of the House becomes more narrow. On the Republican side, if the five new seats give the GOP a majority, Texas could become the linchpin for advancing the Trump administration’s second-term agenda.

And let's look at some of the Democrats who would be drawn out of a job next year.

U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett of Austin is the dean of the Texas delegation and has been in Congress since 1995. This term, he serves as the ranking member of the House Ways and Means Committee subcommittee on health. That's the panel that handles legislation relating to health programs under Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

If Democrats win control of the U.S. House, Doggett would be in a position to chair that committee. It's not too much of an exaggeration to say that nearly everyone in every district has a family member or a close friend who relies on the federal health programs.

The proposed map would pit Doggett against a relative newcomer, U.S. Rep. Greg Casar, who was elected in 2022 after serving on the Austin City Council. In only his second term, Casar chairs the House Progressive Caucus. The national Democratic Party, it seems, is always in a tug-of-war between progressives on the left and moderates in the middle.

As chairman of the progressives, Casar has both hands — and a loud voice — on that rope both sides are pulling on.

U.S. Rep. Al Green of Houston, elected in 2004, is the most senior Black member of the Texas delegation. Now, he's the ranking member of the House subcommittee on oversight and investigations. In the spring, Green filed a resolution (unlikely to pass) to again bring impeachment charges against Trump.

Were he chairman of that panel, Green would likely have a louder megaphone with which to amplify those charges.

On the other hand, if the GOP loses the House in 2026, powerful Texas Republicans would become the ones filing symbolic legislation. They would hold no committee chairmanships, and just like their time in the minority in 2021, Republicans would be powerless to block things like the Jan. 6 committee hearings or other actions of the Trump administration.

Given all that's at stake in the upcoming election cycle, Texas is very much in play in how it all might turn out.