Who says history never repeats itself? 22 years ago, in an effort to block a redistricting plan in the Lone Star State of Texas, 52 Democrats from their state house fled to Ardmore, Oklahoma, denying a quorum to move forward with a vote on new districts. The stunt lasted four days until it fell apart.
Shortly thereafter, 11 Democrats from the state's senate pulled the same stunt, this time fleeing to Albuquerque, New Mexico, where after a monthlong delay, their ranks broke as well. The redistricting vote happened, and it survived an immediate legal challenge. The maps have largely been in place ever since...until Friday.
This past weekend, Texas Republicans finalized their plan for a mid-decade redistricting plan, with the potential of adding up to five new seats favorable to the GOP in 2026. How did Democrats react to this coming vote? They ran away...again. Our friend, Salena Zito, not only remembers this happening in 2003, but brought the receipts.
It’s déjà vu all over again 22 years later https://t.co/YauGE7qJyP pic.twitter.com/MEfx413h6c
— ZitoSalena (@ZitoSalena) August 4, 2025
Gerrymandering is not a new phenomenon. The term was coined around 1812 after then-Massachusetts Governor Elbridge Gerry signed off on a plan to carve up districts in the Bay state in a way that favored his political party. One of the creatively-drawn districts actually resembled the shape of a salamander.
But even though the name gerrymandering was born after this particular event, it was not the first time in American politics games were played with Congressional seats. Virginia and Pennsylvania were carving up districts in their states from 1789 forward when the Constitution gave them the power to draw their own Congressional district lines. It's literally been a thing since the founding document was ratified. Both parties currently do it. The Whigs did it. The Federalists did it. Gerrymandering is the oldest part of American politics, and perhaps the only thing just as old are the complaints from the parties on the short end of the stick when gerrymandering is done.
As we enter the halfway point between U.S. Census counts, there are as many as seven Republican-led states considering action to redraw their lines ahead of the 2026 midterms to reflect recent population growth and maximize their political representation in Congress. Up to 17 new Republican-leaning seats could be created if state legislatures in Texas, Florida, Indiana, Missouri, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and West Virginia run the table, but Texas is the big prize.
With up to five new seats alone in the Lone Star State, when you look at how thin the Republican majority is in the House of Representatives, a margin of 3, you can see why Republicans from Donald Trump down to state representatives are so motivated to move now while they can.
The Voting Rights Act, which has operated under a legal loophole in Section 2 that allows for private actions to be brought in court to essentially create districts on racial lines rather than geographic ones, seems to be on very shaky ground as the conservatives on the Supreme Court have indicated an interest to gut the VRA. In a lone dissent last month, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote this.
I am hopeful that this Court will soon realize that the conflict its §2 jurisprudence has sown with the Constitution is too severe to ignore.
The perceived weakness of the Voting Rights Act, combined with the mass migration of voters from blue to red states, has caused a lot of these red states like Texas to not wait for the next Census, but act now and capitalize on their growing power and influence. Texas state house Democrats, led by one of the new media darlings on the left, James Talarico, announced they were bugging out instead of just voting no on the new plan.
My Democratic colleagues and I just left the state of Texas to break quorum and stop Trump’s redistricting power grab.
— James Talarico (@jamestalarico) August 3, 2025
Trump is trying to rig the midterm elections right before our eyes. But first he’ll have to come through us.
It’s time to fight back. pic.twitter.com/xOshwmy2eA
Now for the truly laughable part of the story. The place to which Texas Democrats chose to flee in order to protest the end of democracy occurring in the Lone Star state? Illinois. Have you seen their Congressional map recently?
Fleeing to Illinois, the most egregiously gerrymandered state in the country, to make as clear as possible this stunt is about partisanship not principle. Chef's kiss. https://t.co/xsXRxFqPHy pic.twitter.com/DmVcEmxan2
— Phil Kerpen (@kerpen) August 4, 2025
Illinois has 17 Congressional districts. Between 55-60% of the state votes Democratic, depending on the electoral cycle, but somehow Democrats in that state managed to rock a 14-3 Democratic edge in their representation in Washington. Texas Democrats using Illinois as their safe haven from which to complain about how unfair the process back home is the kind of optics of which Republicans can only dream.
It gets better. Their ride to Illinois? This pretty little private number.
The tail of the Democrats’ private jet is preparing to taxi to the runway before takeoff. #txlege pic.twitter.com/ofwvlC9WJX
— John C. Moritz (@JohnnieMo) August 3, 2025
Once they got there, who got to do the talking? Illinois' Governor, J.B. Pritzker, who is also running for president. How do I know this? Look at the signage behind him and the Texas Democrats.
“We will not let power go unchecked.” As @GovPritzker welcomes Texas Dem lawmakers to Illinois (with his campaign signage behind him) #TexasDems #redistricting pic.twitter.com/FLPHrrCoIX
— Mary Ann Ahern (@MaryAnnAhernNBC) August 4, 2025
So Texas Democrats just provided an in-kind campaign donation for J.B. Pritzker? That's spectacular.
Part of the fun about this story is that Democratic governors, like Pritzker, New York's Kathy Hochul, and especially California's Gavin Newsom, are all talking a good threatening game that if Republican states do this, they'll go nuclear in blue states to counteract the perceived advantage going into the midterms. The problem with that? Democrats have already gerrymandered their blue states within an inch of their lives. There's not much more blood to be squeezed out of those turnips.
And in California's case, backed largely by Democrats in 2008, Proposition 11 was passed, creating an independent commission to gerrymander state legislative districts. And two years later, Proposition 20 included Congressional seats as well. Both propositions became included into the California Constitution. They cannot be easily undone...unless you're Gavin Newsom.
Newsom has now promised to redraw Congressional Republicans out of existence, but legally has no ability to do so. He is planning on offering up another state proposition in the fall to countermand the propositions he supported 15 years ago. The reason he doesn't like them now is because the results weren't severe enough. If his proposition passes, which is no sure thing this year, it's unclear if it'll survive its own legal challenge. Regardless, in all of the Republican states leaning towards redrawing the lines, there are no legal or state constitutional impediments getting in the way.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, in a primary bid for United States Senate against incumbent John Cornyn, reacted to the Democrats fleeing the state.
I support the immediate arrest of these rogue lawmakers who’ve fled their duties. These radical Democrats are spitting in the face of every Texan they swore to represent. This is cowardice and dereliction of duty, and they should face the full force of the law without apology. https://t.co/cE6fZowNmR
— Attorney General Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) August 3, 2025
Paxton wants to go bounty hunter on the rogue lawmakers, and Dustin Burrows is the Speaker of Texas' state House. All options are on the table, he says. So what will Governor Greg Abbott do? Maybe this.
🚨BREAKING NEWS from TX Governor Greg Abbott:
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) August 4, 2025
“This truancy ends now. The derelict Democrat House members must return to Texas and be in attendance when the House reconvenes at 3:00 PM on Monday, August 4, 2025. For any member who fails to do so, I will invoke Texas Attorney… pic.twitter.com/lCg1LXSyum
And here I thought Abbott would just keep calling for special session after special session, forcing these Democrats to abandon their families and pay for their stunt of a road trip indefinitely. Declaring their seats vacant and refilling them with appointments is a power move to be sure, and escalates things very nicely. Not sure that will stand up in court, but raising the ante and bringing this stupid Brave Sir Robin running away gambit to a head once and for all is something I support. I'm all for breaking the will of these clowns.
Back to Talarico for a minute. He is a Democrat legislator first and foremost. He's also a Christian pastor. A liberal Christian pastor. A very liberal Christian pastor. As a Christian myself, I'm not a huge fan of people from either side of the ideological aisle trying to put Jesus and/or God in a box somewhere on the political spectrum. My God is bigger than American politics. But I always love it when people like Talarico speak out against those on the right who try to contort Jesus as a Republican...by contorting Jesus into a Democrat.
Christian Nationalism is perverting my faith and subverting our democracy.
— James Talarico (@jamestalarico) March 28, 2024
It’s incumbent upon Christians to call out this dangerous ideology.
That’s why I spoke at my home church about the threat of Christian Nationalism. pic.twitter.com/UPCcRU0tRG
That's funny, the Bible I read instructs that you are to love sinners, but hate the sin. In Talarico's theocracy, all sin is welcomed and celebrated by the One telling us to hate it.
In another of Talarico's more recent media appearances, this time on Joe Rogan's podcast, he made the Christian case for being pro-abortion.
Presbyterian Texas state rep James Talarico tells Joe Rogan there's nothing in the Bible against homosexuality or abortion, and that it was "pro choice" for the Blessed Virgin Mary to agree to conceive by the Holy Ghost.
— Mason-Dixon Latin Mass Society (@MDLatinMass) July 23, 2025
Because heresy makes you stupid.
pic.twitter.com/8wGnRsbfFv
Again, the Bible I read isn't left or right. It isn't Big or Small government. It's a guidebook for how you should interact with God, how you should interact with others, and how to live your best life, the one God gave you to live. As for that life, God, who existed before time existed, and will exist after time as we know it ends, doesn't start your own personal hourglass as soon as you navigate the birth canal and drop into the world. Jeremiah 1:5 is pretty precise.
Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.
Talarico can wrap himself up in morality all he wishes, believing he is righteous in abandoning the state in order to slow the process down of accurately reflecting the state's population in electoral maps. But since he likes to bring Christian analogies to bear, imagine Joseph and his betrothed, Mary, great with child, deciding not to make the trip to Bethlehem to be counted and taxed. That would be unfair. In Talarico's Nativity, Joseph and Mary would have left Nazareth to Jerusalem, which was considered in Biblical times to be the most hostile city to Rome. That's where the first Jewish uprising took place after all.
My hunch is this Illinois vacation stunt will be short-lived. The backdrop of whining about gerrymandering from the most egregiously gerrymandered state in the country will be too much for Texas Democrats to withstand. As for California? Trump's Department of Justice is having a little look-see at California's voting rolls, now that they're not going to be able to hang around as a sanctuary state any longer. In 2025, the nation's immigration and election laws means something again.
Strike while you can, Republicans. These are not new rules we are living by, and it is long past time that the GOP engage in politics as they are and have always been thus, not as some would wish them to be.
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