Donald Trump seems unsettled by the prospect of Democrats winning back the House in November’s midterms, something made evident during his pep talk to House Republicans on Jan. 6.
And those fears are the agar for the ongoing, Trump-induced redistricting war, which looks to be ramping up again.
Trump took an L to close out the year when Indiana Republicans rebuffed his attempts to force them to redraw their congressional districts ahead of the midterms. But Florida is currently rushing to meet the president’s demands. On Wednesday, Gov. Ron DeSantis formally called for a special session to redraw his state’s already gerrymandered districts in ways even more favorable to Republicans.
It’ll be a risky endeavor that could backfire, as Tim Henderson reported for Stateline, given that voters in Florida’s cities have demonstrated a liberal swing of late — even in places such as Miami that are seen as friendly to Trump and the GOP. Nonetheless, as NBC News recently noted, DeSantis scheduled the session to occur right before the candidate filing deadline this spring, which could potentially allow Florida Republicans to consider a forthcoming Supreme Court decision that could — and by many experts’ estimation, likely will — permit racist gerrymandering and thereby make Florida’s redistricting efforts even easier.
There has been some movement in blue states as well.
Democrats controlling Virginia’s General Assembly are expected to vote soon in favor of a constitutional amendment — to ultimately be put to voters — that would allow for mid-decade redistricting. And despite the prospect looking dead in the water last year, Democratic lawmakers in Washington state introduced a bill this week that would tee up a ballot initiative asking voters whether to allow for mid-decade redistricting. Politico’s Natalie Fertig reported that Washington Democrats don’t expect the bill to pass with the legislature’s current makeup, but they are pushing it to signal their priorities if they are given the two-thirds majority required to pass such a measure in November’s elections. In the event you’ve forgotten what precipitated this chaos, Trump initiated Republicans’ gerrymandering push when he and his administration pressured Texas to force through a new congressional map that established more GOP-friendly districts and diluted Black voters’ collective power. Some states, such as Missouri and North Carolina, have followed suit with similar efforts that are currently facing legal challenges and a potential referendum. California is the lone Democratic-led state to have already redrawn its districts in response to the Republican-led gambit, having been authorized by voters in November.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog. 
