The U.S. Supreme Court has temporarily restored Texas’s controversial 2025 congressional redistricting map, with Justice Samuel Alito issuing an administrative stay on November 21 that blocks a lower court ruling that found the map likely violates the Constitution through racial gerrymandering.
On November 18, a three-judge federal panel ruled 2-1 that Texas engaged in unconstitutional racial gerrymandering when redrawing its congressional districts mid-decade. The 160-page opinion by U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Brown, a Trump appointee, concluded that “substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered the 2025 Map”.
The court ordered Texas to use its 2021 congressional map for the upcoming 2026 midterm elections, delivering a significant blow to Republican efforts to gain five additional House seats through the redistricting.
The redistricting effort began after Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon sent Texas officials a letter on July 7, 2025, claiming four of the state’s congressional districts were unconstitutional “coalition districts” where Black and Hispanic voters combine to form a majority. Dhillon warned the state must “rectify” these districts or face legal action.
Texas Republicans seized on this directive to redraw the map during a special legislative session in August, targeting Democratic-held seats in districts with substantial minority populations. Governor Greg Abbott signed the new map into law on August 29, 2025.
Justice Alito’s administrative stay came less than an hour after Texas filed an emergency petition with the Supreme Court. The one-page order temporarily allows Texas to continue using the 2025 map while the justices consider the matter, with plaintiffs required to respond by November 24 at 5 p.m.
The stay is procedural and says nothing about the merits of the case.
Under the challenged map, white voters in Texas would control 70 percent of congressional districts despite comprising only 40 percent of the state’s population.
The candidate filing deadline in Texas is on December 8 and Texas’s primary election is scheduled for March 3, 2026.
