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Following the calamitous U.S. Supreme Court ruling on Wednesday that dismantled enforcement mechanisms for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) told reporters that, if Republicans continue trying to redistrict their states to gain a political advantage in the 2026 midterms, Democrats should respond in kind.
Ocasio-Cortez has been a staunch proponent of redistricting reform, to bar states from drawing congressional boundaries that favor one party over the other. But if Republicans seek to make matters worse in the months ahead, Democrats shouldn’t sit idly by, she said.
“We have to all play by the same set of rules. And the Republican caucus has made it clear that they want, and are setting rules, of partisan gerrymandering,” Ocasio-Cortez explained, noting that Democrats have “tried to pass nonpartisan gerrymandering for 10 years” in Congress.
She added:
If Republicans are going to redraw North Carolina, if they’re going to redraw Texas, if they’re going to redraw and gerrymander every one of their states, then unfortunately, we have to provide balance to that until we get to the day when we can all finally agree to put this behind us and pass nonpartisan gerrymandering federally.
Several Democratic lawmakers in Congress have supported reforms to block partisan redistricting, including last fall when they introduced the Redistricting Reform Act.
The legislation would require states to form commissions, made up of equal representation of the top two political parties in the previous election cycle, to redraw maps every 10 years. The measure would also forbid mid-census redrawing of maps, except in special legal circumstances, and would require state commissions to “respect communities of interest” and “representational needs based on common ethnic, racial, economic, Tribal, social, cultural, geographic, or historic identities, or arising from similar socioeconomic conditions.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s comments came shortly after the conservative-led Supreme Court dismantled protections for nonwhite voters in a ruling on Wednesday, ruling that mechanisms used by lower courts to require Black-majority districts in states where those voters have been suppressed through gerrymandering were unconstitutional.
Liberal bloc Justice Elena Kagan wrote a scathing dissent to the conservative majority’s decision, calling it a complete “demolition of the Voting Rights Act.” The conservative justices’ reasoning allows for a state to, “without legal consequence, systematically dilute minority citizens’ voting power,” she wrote.
Hours after the ruling was rendered, Florida Republicans passed into law new congressional maps reducing the number of Democratic-led districts by half, despite a state constitutional amendment barring partisan gerrymandering in the Sunshine State. Mississippi lawmakers also indicated that they may return to their state capitol next month to redraw their maps, including potentially redrawing the single Democratic district in the state that has a Black majority population.
Some state lawmakers have openly stated that they intend to redraw maps for partisan purposes.
“This ruling likely opens the door to redrawing Mississippi’s congressional districts. Mississippi might no longer have a district drawn to protect [Democratic Congressman] Bennie Thompson,” Republican State Auditor Shad White said.
Early evaluations of the potential redistricting of Southern states that had previously been somewhat constrained from racial gerrymandering under the Voting Rights Act before the Supreme Court’s ruling this week show that up to seven districts could shift from Democratic to Republican control under a redraw. Notably, the evaluations — from The Cook Political Report and Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball, which came to separate but similar conclusions — do not take into account Florida’s redraw, which could shift four additional seats to Republicans.
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