Supreme Court Clears Way for California Voting Map

Sorting ballots at a processing center in City of Industry after the special election in November that asked California’s voters to approve a new congressional map.Credit...Philip Cheung for The New York Times

By Abbie VanSickle

Reporting from Washington

Feb. 4, 2026, 2:00 p.m. ET

The Supreme Court on Wednesday cleared the way for California to use a new congressional map designed to help Democrats for the midterm elections.

The justices rejected an emergency request by the California Republican Party to override an appeals court and block the map before the November vote. The decision is a victory for Democrats, who had devised the plan after President Trump pushed Republican-led states to redraw their maps to help the G.O.P. pick up seats in the election.

The order did not include a vote count or the court’s reasoning, which is typical in such emergency decisions.

The dispute is the latest challenge to a state congressional map to come before the justices in recent months.

 

In December, the Supreme Court cleared the way for Texas to use its new congressional voting map for the midterm elections. Texas Republican leaders had asked the court to weigh in after a divided panel of federal judges had temporarily blocked the map, which was designed to help the G.O.P. potentially pick up seats.

In a concurring opinion in the Texas case, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. nodded to efforts to gain a partisan advantage by both parties before the midterms, writing that it was “indisputable” that “the impetus for the adoption of the Texas map (like the map subsequently adopted in California) was partisan advantage pure and simple.” Courts have said it is legal to gerrymander based on party politics as opposed to race.