JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
This week, the country's two most populous states each took another step toward reshaping the national political landscape. President Trump initiated a redistricting arms race when he urged Texas to redraw its congressional map to boost Republicans. And now, in response, California leaders are going to ask their state's voters to approve a new map, one that helps Democrats. Today, we wanted to take a step back and talk about all of that and about power and democracy. So we're joined now by NPR voting correspondents Miles Parks and Ashley Lopez. Hi to both of you.
MILES PARKS, BYLINE: Hey there.
ASHLEY LOPEZ, BYLINE: Hey.
SUMMERS: Ashley, I'll start with you. Can you just get us up to speed on the latest about redistricting?
LOPEZ: Yeah, sure. So the two big states to watch in all this, Texas and California, have passed legislation this week. In Texas, the Republican-led state legislature is on the verge of sending a new congressional map to the governor for approval. This new map creates five more favorable seats for the GOP, which is what President Trump asked for.
And in response to Texas, the Democratic-led California legislature has approved legislation that would put a ballot measure before voters this November that would ask for their approval for California to basically do the same thing. Governor Gavin Newsom has signed the legislation, which means the race is on now to convince voters over the next two months to approve that ballot measure.
SUMMERS: And do I understand correctly that other states are also looking at doing this?
LOPEZ: Yeah, that's right. And I'm going to start with Ohio. That is a Republican-led state that actually has to draw new maps this year because of some quirkiness with their redistricting process. Republican leaders in Florida, Missouri and Indiana have also all signaled that they plan to redraw their congressional maps as well. And we are seeing more Democratic and left-leaning groups urge blue states to counter with their own redistricting plans. But a number of Democratic states, I should say, have rules that make it harder for them to gerrymander for partisan gains, especially mid-decade like this.
SUMMERS: Got it. Miles, Ashley mentioned gerrymandering, when voting maps are purposely manipulated, which is, of course, been around for a while. It's not new. So help us understand, how is what we're seeing happening right now different?
PARKS: Right. I mean, gerrymandering has been around basically as long as America...
SUMMERS: Right.
PARKS: ...Has. But there was a definite turning point, specifically in 2019. That year, the Supreme Court ruled that federal courts could not stop states from partisan gerrymandering. And even at that time, experts said, essentially, this would rip open the floodgates to this sort of manipulation. The guardrails were essentially ripped off. But it's also clear that this is part of a broader trend from President Trump, pushing against the limits of democracy when it comes to consolidating power. I was talking yesterday with Senator Alex Padilla, who's a Democrat from California. Here's how he put it.
ALEX PADILLA: They know their agenda is so unpopular their only hope of holding onto power is to rig the election. I mean, when I heard find me five more seats, Republican seats in Texas, it sounded a lot like find me 11,000 more votes in Georgia after he lost the 2020 election.
PARKS: He's, of course, referring to the phone call that Trump made to the secretary of state of Georgia in...
SUMMERS: Right.
PARKS: ...2020. And it's important to note, this is not just maps and redrawing them. We're seeing the Trump White House push the boundaries of federal power in all sorts of federal - all sorts of election policy, I should say. Earlier this week, he hinted at an executive order that would be coming soon that potentially could try to curb male voting and also curb the use of some voting machines, though we haven't seen the text of that order yet.
SUMMERS: OK. Let's stay on the executive order for a second. President Trump spoke about this during a news conference, and he was explicit about his partisan goals - that he wants to get rid of voting by mail because it is, quote, "the only way Democrats get elected." Let's listen.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: That's bigger than anything having to do with redistricting, believe me. And the Republicans have to get smart. We're not going to have a country. I said, for a long time at rallies, every - you need borders and you need free and fair elections.
SUMMERS: Ashley Lopez, if you can, just help us put this planned executive order into context.
LOPEZ: Sure. So Donald Trump obviously has a long history at this point of casting doubt on the legitimacy of elections before people actually vote, and especially mail-in ballots. And just for some fact-checking, there is not a widespread problem with security and reliability of voting by mail. We just had an election last year that Donald Trump won that included the widespread use of mail ballots. And what's important to note here is that Trump actually doesn't have the legal authority to tell states how to run their elections. The Constitution is very clear about this. But despite that, voting rights advocates say this is a way for Trump to destabilize our elections and cast doubt on the legitimacy of the midterm election results.
SUMMERS: I mean, speaking of the midterm results in those ballots, Miles Parks, how might voters see these efforts to manipulate election results?
PARKS: I mean, Juana, for a long time, the political wisdom was that voters hated this sort of - when politicians change rules specifically to benefit themselves. But it's important to remember that we're living in this sort of post 2024 reality, right? Donald Trump won the popular vote last year after trying to overturn a fair election in 2020. A plurality of Americans either said, I don't care that he did that, I don't mind that he did that or I don't believe that he did that. So it's really unclear at this point how voters are going to feel about these other sort of actions to manipulate the system. And also, because there were no political ramifications for Trump's behavior in 2020, it makes sense that other politicians are suddenly a little bit more open to pushing the boundaries on democracy as well.
LOPEZ: And I should say, in that same election, we also saw, like, various reform efforts in states across the country fail. Most of these efforts, by the way, were aimed at making our politics less partisan, which is something voters have long said they want. And I do think this ballot measure in California, though, will give us a good sense of how voters actually feel about skirting some good government rules to benefit a political party.
SUMMERS: NPR voting correspondents Ashley Lopez and Miles Parks. Thanks to both of you.
PARKS: Thanks.
LOPEZ: Yeah, thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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