Texas senators hold new public hearing on redistricting plan

AUSTIN (Nexstar) -- Sunday afternoon, State Senators launched a public hearing on a bill to redraw congressional voting districts in Texas. The hearing comes two days after Governor Greg Abbott called a second special session of the Texas Legislature.

Congressional redistricting is one of the 19 items on Abbott’s special session agenda.

A public hearing is required before a bill can advance for a vote on the Senate floor. Senators approved an identical bill on August 12 in the first special session.

The previous effort to pass the redistricting legislation failed after more than 50 Texas House Democrats left the state to break quorum.  Democratic lawmakers say the new map is an attack on the representation of minority voters in the districts being redrawn.

“We did exactly what we said we needed to do, and that is bringing a spotlight on this issue,” State Rep. Josey Garcia, D-San Antonio said in an interview one day before Gov. Abbott called the second special session.

House leaders expect that the House will have enough members present Monday to conduct legislative business.

State Sen. Phil King, R-Weatherford, is the author of Senate Bill 4, which he said is identical to legislation filed in the first special session. The redistricting plan would give Republicans a partisan advantage in five congressional districts currently held by Democrats. President Donald Trump previously called for Texas leaders to redraw maps to gain Republican seats in the 2026 elections.

“Just a very simple redrawing, we pick up five seats,” the president told reporters last month.

At the start of today’s hearing, Sen. King said the bill met three objectives he had for a map.

“The first one, and most important, is that it be legal, and this map is is legal with regard to all applicable law. The second is that it would perform better for Republicans, and this map does perform better, by my judgment, for Republicans,” King said.

He added that the maps achieved a third objective that he had not had when the maps were first proposed. “We heard a lot of testimony that the current map had a number of districts that were not compact, were not close together, were not tight, in in their in their design, and in this map, listening to that testimony, we applied it, and this map also is much more compact than the current congressional redistricting map.”

The proposed changes target five districts in areas around Austin, Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio, creating Republican-leaning seats.  Bill authors have pointed out that the maps also establish new majority-minority districts. Under the plan, four of the five redrawn districts would have Hispanic citizen voting-age population majorities.