NC Lawmakers To Revisit Congressional Maps Next Week

By Carolina Journal Staff

North Carolina lawmakers plan to return to Raleigh next week to consider a new congressional map after President Donald Trump called on Republican-led legislatures to counter redistricting efforts by Democrats in blue states.

“President Trump earned a clear mandate from the voters of North Carolina and the rest of the country, and we intend to defend it by drawing an additional Republican Congressional seat,” said House Speaker Destin Hall, R-Caldwell, in a press release Monday afternoon. “Our state won’t stand by while Democrats like Gavin Newsom redraw districts to aid in their effort to obtain a majority in the U.S. House. We will not allow them to undermine the will of the voters and President Trump’s agenda.”

Senate Leader Phil Berger, R-Rockingham, said the move is intended to protect Republican control of Congress. In recent weeks, Gov. Josh Stein, a Democrat, criticized Berger after a rumor circulated by the left-wing group Carolina Forward alleged that Berger was offering to redraw the First Congressional District in exchange for an endorsement from Trump. Berger denied the claims.

“President Trump delivered countless victories during his first term in office, and nine months into his second term, he continues to achieve unprecedented wins,” Berger said. “We are doing everything we can to protect President Trump’s agenda, which means safeguarding Republican control of Congress. Picking up where Texas left off, we will hold votes in our October session to redraw North Carolina’s congressional map to ensure Gavin Newsom doesn’t decide the congressional majority.”

Newsom is governor of California, where Democrats have engaged in redistricting to maximize their party’s seats in the US House of Representatives.

Reps. Brenden Jones, R-Columbus; and Hugh Blackwell, R-Burke, chairs of the House Redistricting Committee, said they view the effort as a direct response to actions by Democrats in California. There, lawmakers have placed a constitutional amendment called the Election Rigging Response Act on the ballot for a special election on Nov. 4. If voters approve it, the state would temporarily suspend its independent redistricting commission and allow the state legislature to enact a new map in time for 2026 elections that is more favorable to Democrats.

“We’re stepping into this redistricting battle because California and the radical left are attempting to rig the system to handpick who runs Congress,” the lawmakers said in a joint statement. “This ploy is nothing new, and North Carolina will not stand by while they attempt to stack the deck. President Trump has called on us to fight back, and North Carolina stands ready to level the playing field.”

North Carolina’s Gov. Josh Stein, a Democrat, called the announcement “shameless.”

“The General Assembly works for North Carolina, not Donald Trump,” Stein said in a statement Monday evening. “The Republican leadership in the General Assembly has failed to pass a budget, failed to pay our teachers and law enforcement what they deserve, and failed to fully fund Medicaid. Now they are failing you, the voters.”

Sen. Ralph Hise, R-Mitchell, chair of the Senate redistricting committee, said, “North Carolina was the target of the Democrats’ sue-until-blue scheme, and we’re prepared to bring forward a new Congressional map to defeat this new scheme.”

Andy Jackson, director of the Civitas Center for Public Integrity at the John Locke Foundation, warned that redrawing districts could have unintended political consequences.

“Republicans risk drawing a so-called ‘dummymander’ that could end up benefiting Democrats,” he said. “Unless they plan to change the entire map, they will most likely make the First District more Republican at the expense of making the Third District less Republican. That would make both districts Republican-leaning but competitive. Since the president’s party tends to suffer in midterm elections, Democrats would have a shot at winning both of them.”

Jackson added that altering the district’s racial composition could invite litigation.

“Any change that significantly drops that number, especially if it also negatively affects the district’s compactness and splits more counties, will make it less likely to survive the inevitable lawsuit,” he said.

A long history of redistricting battles
North Carolina has been one of the most litigated states in the nation when it comes to redistricting. For more than three decades, congressional and legislative maps have repeatedly been struck down, redrawn, and challenged again, often on claims of racial or partisan gerrymandering.

In the 1990s, the state’s 12th Congressional District became a national flashpoint after a Democrat-led General Assembly drew a “snake-like” district that stretched along Interstate 85 to include large numbers of black voters. The resulting court battles reshaped how race could be used in redistricting.

In 2010, Republicans won legislative majorities using Democrat-drawn maps. Over the following decade, Republican-drawn maps faced a wave of lawsuits from Democratic groups and their allies, leading to multiple rounds of court-ordered redraws between 2016 and 2022. The state’s high court ultimately imposed a one-time-use map designed to yield an even 7–7 split between Republicans and Democrats in Congress.

In 2023, the newly elected Republican majority on the NC Supreme Court reversed course in Harper v. Hall, ruling that partisan considerations in mapmaking are political questions beyond judicial review. After that ruling, the General Assembly drew a map that was likely to elect 10 Republicans and three Democrats with one swing district. Democrats won that district in 2024, leading to the current 10-4 split in the congressional delegation.

The General Assembly is scheduled to reconvene on Monday, Oct. 20.