The US Supreme Court has allowed California to use a new voting map that favours Democrats, paving the way for the party to gain up to five congressional seats this year.
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The unsigned order from the court did not give a reason for the decision.
Californians approved changing the state’s voting districts last year in a referendum, with the aim of cancelling gains made by Republicans through a redrawn map in Texas. Each district sends a lawmaker to the US House.
The Republican party is working to hold on to its thin majority in the House in November’s midterm elections. Historically, the party of the current president loses House seats during this congressional vote.
The court declined a request from California Republicans – which was backed by the Trump administration – to block the map adopted by California voters in November at the initiative of Gov. Gavin Newsom.
Republicans have a razor-thin majority in the U.S. House. If Democrats seize control, they can thwart Trump’s legislative agenda and launch investigations into his administration.
A group of California Republicans argued the state legislature relied too much on race, rather than politics, to create the new districts.
But the high court, without comment, refused to intervene. It did so two months after ruling that Texas could use a congressional map drawn to help Republicans win as many as five additional seats in the U.S. House.
California’s map, which could give Democrats five more seats, was redrawn in response to Texas’s gambit.
In redistricting battles, the Supreme Court has said federal courts can review whether race was improperly used to draw new lines, but not whether partisan politics was a factor.
California Republicans argued that Democrats were not just trying to offset Texas’s map but also hoping to shore up Latino support for the party.
The GOP pointed to comments made by the consultant who drew the map that the new boundaries could increase Latino voting power. To accomplish this, one district excluded heavily Democratic white neighborhoods near Stockton and instead included less Democratic Latino areas, according to the GOP.
California told the Supreme Court that the Latino voting-age population actually decreased in that district. The number of districts where Latinos make up a majority of voters remained the same.
“It would be passing strange for California to undertake a mid-decade restricting effort with the predominant purpose of benefitting Latino voters and then enact a new map that contains an identical number of Latino-majority districts,” Christopher Hu, the deputy solicitor general of California, wrote in response to the GOP’s emergency appeal.
It also violates the fundamental principles of democracy and judicial impartiality for Republicans to ask the Supreme Court to block California’s partisan gerrymander after it allowed Texas’s map to take effect, Hu added.
A special three-judge panel declined to block the map, ruling 2-1 that Republicans failed to show race was the motivating factor behind the new lines.
“Our conclusion probably seems obvious to anyone who followed the news in the summer and fall of 2025,” Judge Josephine Staton wrote. “The stated goal of the (new map) was to counter the actions of Texas and pick up an additional five Democratic seats.”
In backing California Republicans’ appeal to the Supreme Court, the Justice Department said that even if the state’s overarching goal was undoubtedly political, that is “not a license for district-level racial gerrymandering.”
In the Texas case, by contrast, the Justice Department had argued a lower court got it wrong when ruling the new Texas map likely discriminated against racial minorities by diluting the voting power of Hispanic and Black Texans.
The Supreme Court, over the objections of the three liberal justices, allowed Texas to use the map while the litigation continues.
In Texas, civil rights groups and others challenging the map argue that the political power of racial minorities is being unfairly diminished. In California, Republicans say Democrats are unfairly trying to boost the political power of Latinos.
At the urging of the Trump administration, the GOP-controlled Texas legislature drew new district lines midway through the usual 10-year redistricting cycle, setting off a race among states to get in the game.
Four other states also adopted new congressional maps: Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, and Utah. Other states are considering changes.
The Cook Political Report, a non-partisan handicapper of congressional elections, has predicted that neither party will gain an overall advantage due to redistricting.
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