California lawmakers are voting on Gavin Newsom’s gerrymandering plan. Here’s the latest

California lawmakers today are expected to greenlight Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to ask voters to gerrymander the state’s congressional districts, solidifying the governor’s response to President Donald Trump’s effort to get more GOP seats out of Texas a day after that state passed its own new maps. 

The constitutional amendment that voters will see on their Nov. 4 ballots passed the Assembly and awaits a vote in the Senate. It asks voters to suspend the state’s existing congressional districts, which were drawn by an independent commission, and replace them with a map intended to favor Democrats.

The Assembly passed the measure 57 to 20, and lawmakers on the floor erupted in applause even before they closed the vote.

“We will not let our political system be hijacked by authoritarianism. And today, we give every California the power to say no,” said Speaker Robert Rivas, Democrat of Hollister, on the Assembly floor shortly before the vote. “To say no to Donald Trump’s power grab and yes to our people, to our state and to our democracy.”

California voters in a 2010 ballot measure backed independent redistricting, a process meant to cultivate fair, competitive elections. Democrats say they’re reluctant to give up that system, even temporarily, but believe they have to in order to counter Trump’s bid to retain control of Congress after 2026. 

“If unaddressed, Texas’ actions – which occur without the vote of the populace – will disenfranchise California,” said Assemblymember Josh Lowenthal, a Long Beach Democrat whose father had pushed for nonpartisan redistricting as a state lawmaker and Congressman.

“It’s imperative that Californians have a voice in selecting the political party that controls Congress in 2026,” said Lowenthal in an emotional speech from the floor before the vote. “So today, I proudly join with my father, the architect of this commission, in urging its temporary suspension.”

Republicans before the vote pleaded with their colleagues to resist following Texas in the race to the gerrymandering bottom.

“There’s really only one way to stop – someone has to refrain from striking back, and show a better way,” said Assemblymember James Gallagher, Republican of Chico and the minority leader. 

Lawmakers still need to approve two additional bills that will facilitate and fund the special election, as well as a bill containing the new congressional map voters will be asked to approve. Those measures are set to pass before the Legislature adjourns for the week, and Newsom is expected to sign them today.

The change is intended to be temporary; the measure that will go before voters requires the state to return to nonpartisan map-drawing after the 2030 Census. 

Newsom kicked off the special election scramble after Trump declared that he was “entitled” to five more GOP congressional seats in Texas. He demanded that Lone Star State lawmakers shore up Republicans’ razor thin, three-seat House majority by redrawing their congressional maps mid-decade. When Gov. Greg Abbott indicated Texas would redistrict, Newsom said California would retaliate. 

Democrats today hold 43 of the state’s 52 congressional seats. The Newsom-backed maps transform five Republican seats into districts that heavily favor Democrats. By ousting those incumbents, Newsom would effectively essentially cancel out Trump’s effort in Texas. The maps also strengthen Democrats’ hold on three other competitive California districts, making it harder for the GOP to flip them next year.

California Republican lawmakers spent the week throwing up a variety of procedural blocks to try to stop the bills’ fast-tracked progress through the legislature, including by asking the California Supreme Court to weigh in on their challenge to the short time between the legislation’s public release on Monday and their final vote on the Assembly and Senate floors on Thursday. 

They demanded an end to the redistricting arms race nationwide, with some willing to condemn Texas and other red states that Trump has urged to redraw their maps. 

But their efforts ran up against both political numbers and longtime legislative practice in California. 

Polling shows most Democratic voters want the party to do more to fight the Trump administration. In the past few weeks, Democratic lawmakers, who command a nearly three-quarters supermajority in both chambers, have overwhelmingly fallen in line behind Newsom on the redistricting effort. 

Every year, lawmakers regularly reveal last-minute deals that they fast-track for passage 72 hours later, in a way that nominally complies with state constitutional requirements. 

The timing of the votes may be litigated, but California Republicans have already lost in court once. The state Supreme Court on Wednesday night declined to take up the GOP’s timing-based challenge to the map-drawing effort. 

GOP lawmakers acknowledged they’ll likely have to fight the issue at the polls. 

“We will defeat this, if it’s not here in the Capitol, it will be in a courtroom or it will be at the ballot box,” Assemblymember Alexandra Macedo said this week.