California Legislature clears way for new congressional district map

California Democrats on Thursday approved a constitutional amendment that would put a new state congressional map before voters this fall — their effort to retaliate after Texas Republicans approved a new map for their state that is friendlier to their party.

The California Legislature passed the measure by a 30-8 party-line vote in the Senate and a vote of 57-20 in the Assembly. Only one Democrat in the Assembly opposed the constitutional amendment.

This sets up a ballot initiative in November that, if approved by voters, would temporarily sidestep the independent commission in charge of congressional maps in California, potentially gaining Democrats five congressional seats in the national redistricting battle.

“The chair of the Texas election committee and the author of the new maps has made it very clear that this is a partisan map that they are doing in order to increase Republican power at the urging of Donald Trump,“ state Sen. Christopher Cabaldon said on the floor before the vote. “This is what this vote is about. Let the voters make the decision; we heard them and we are responding, and they are the ultimate judges of whether this is the right way forward.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom is the face of California’s redistricting fight, and he will need to sign the Legislature’s special election measure by Friday, which would kick off a sprint to November. Newsom has been a leading voice urging his party to adopt a more aggressive tack in responding to Republicans’ unprecedented redistricting moves.

“Let’s GO,” the governor tweeted.

Other Democrats lined up behind Newsom’s drive to redistrict the state.

“Republicans are trying to rig the 2026 elections in their favor by stealing enough seats to control Congress regardless of how the people vote. With California’s Election Rigging Response Act, Governor Newsom and California Democrats are fighting back to defend Democracy against Trump’s power grab,” former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told NOTUS in a statement.

On Wednesday, the Texas House of Representatives passed its new congressional map following a weeks-long standoff during which Democrats fled the state to break quorum. By doing so, the Democrats delayed the state Legislature from adopting the map following a request by President Trump to find five additional Republican-safe seats.

“Big WIN for the Great State of Texas!!! Everything Passed, on our way to FIVE more Congressional seats and saving your Rights, your Freedoms, and your Country,” Trump wrote Wednesday on Truth Social, adding that other states like Florida and Indiana were “looking” to follow through with similar redistricting efforts.

Democrats in California had vowed to move forward with their redistricting plans only if Texas Republicans moved forward with theirs.

“Yesterday, Texas moved forward with their Trump power grab so this notion of ‘conditioning’ is no longer applicable — it is self-evident that California will need to move forward in response to what Texas has done,” Newsom’s office wrote in a statement, local media reported Thursday.

Proposition 50, as it will be called on the ballot, would temporarily sidestep the California Citizens Redistricting Commission, which is the independent entity charged with drawing congressional maps in the state and enact a partisan map drawn by the Legislature. The commission, which remains overwhelmingly popular among Californians, would resume its work after the 2030 census.

The map would make the odds of getting reelected tougher for the majority of Republicans in Congress from the state. That includes the competitive congressional seat of Rep. David Valadao in the Central Valley, which already leaned Democratic.

“California voters made it clear in 2008 that they wanted an independent commission, not partisan politicians like Gavin Newsom, drawing gerrymandered districts to benefit his political party,” Valadao wrote to NOTUS in a statement.

Republicans from the state have warned that sidestepping the independent redistricting commission would erode trust in the election system in California. Critics of the proposal submitted a legal challenge earlier this week that was rejected by the California Supreme Court on Wednesday.

“California’s constitution forbids politicians from drawing their own lines for good reason, politicians shouldn’t pick their voters,” Rep. Doug LaMalfa, one of the Republicans whose district would go from safely Republican to safely Democratic if maps are approved, told NOTUS in a statement. “Californians specifically stripped this power from the Legislature in favor of an independent process. Nothing has changed that partisan gerrymandering is a bad idea.”

Other Republicans who are already grappling with how the new maps would affect their prospects of staying in Congress have vowed to try to defeat the measure in November and outlaw gerrymandering nationwide.

“Make no mistake, I will win reelection to the House regardless of the proposed changes to my district,” Rep. Kevin Kiley, a Republican who supports a federal ban on partisan redistricting, said in a statement to NOTUS. “But I fully expect that the beautiful 3rd District will remain exactly as it is. We will defeat Newsom’s sham initiative and vindicate the will of California voters.”

This story was produced as part of a partnership between NOTUS — a publication from the nonprofit, nonpartisan Allbritton Journalism Institute — and NewsWell, home of Times of San Diego, Santa Barbara News-Press and Stocktonia.