JEFFREY BLEHAR: Begun, the Gerrymandering Wars Have.
Last Sunday, Democrats in Texas’s state legislature fled from Austin to Chicago, Ill., in order to deny Governor Greg Abbott the quorum necessary to push through legislation redrawing Texas’s congressional map. The new map more or less guarantees three additional safe Republican seats for the state delegation, while creating two others within reach during a good electoral year.
2026 is not expected to be such a year for Republicans nationally, due both to the controversies created by the Trump administration’s policies as well as the deeper structural dynamics of American election cycles. (The party holding the presidency always faces headwinds in the midterms, absent historically anomalous circumstances.)
The move by Texas Republicans — neither illegal nor unprecedented in recent Texas history, but certainly unusual — came at Trump’s behest. He is rightfully concerned about the consequences of a Democratic-controlled House of Representatives for the last two years of his term. (If it happens, set the over-under for “articles of impeachment voted upon” at 1 and take the over.) Every extra Republican seat — even in a narrow minority — is a buffer against this.
Every action breeds a counterreaction, however, and Democrats have responded by immediately threatening to bulldoze their own pieties into a landfill. Governor Gavin Newsom posted the phrase “FAFO” on social media — readers are free to look up the term’s meaning on their own — as he announced his intent to similarly redistrict California from its current 43D–9R delegation into a desolate wasteland of Democratic blue.
What’s that you say? California has an independent redistricting commission that by law cannot undertake mid-decade redistricting? No matter: Newsom proposes to put a constitutional amendment on the November 2025 ballot that would “temporarily” relieve the commissioners of duty for a few cycles before returning them to power. (How very constitutional of him.)
To coin a phrase, “The 600 series had rubber skin. We spotted them easy, but these are new. They look human… sweat, bad breath, everything. Very hard to spot:”
People act like Newsom is human. He has no human thoughts he has no idea who he is, he wants votes other than that he has zero thoughts and no convictions. I talked to him for over an hour there is nothing there https://t.co/wNw7l1c3Uu
— Adam Carolla (@adamcarolla) August 9, 2025