Gov. Gavin Newsom’s plan to adopt temporary congressional maps to favor Democrats is facing strong opposition, a new poll shows.
Gov. Gavin Newsom and Democratic lawmakers face an uphill battle to convince Californians to redraw congressional maps before the midterm elections next year, according to a poll released on Aug. 14.
Nearly two-thirds of Californians surveyed by the Politico-Citrin Center-Possibility Lab disagreed with the idea of changing the state’s current nonpartisan redistricting system.
In response to Texas’s congressional redistricting plan, which would potentially help Republicans grow their currently slim majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, Newsom announced a plan on Aug. 14 that would allow the state’s Democratic Party leaders to adopt favorable “temporary” congressional maps to give their party five more seats in the U.S. House by turning over five seats currently held by the state’s Republican representatives.
He said he plans to submit a legislative package next week for a state constitutional amendment to allow voters to make the changes.
If passed, voters could decide in November whether to support Newsom’s Election Rigging Response Act in a special election. Voters will be asked to temporarily adopt new California congressional districts for use in elections through 2030.
The proposition would leave California’s current congressional maps in place if Texas or other states also keep their original maps.
Newsom, speaking to reporters on Aug. 14, said he expected to release the new maps imminently.
“People are eager to see the maps,” Newsom said. “We anticipate that these maps will completely neuter and neutralize what is happening in Texas.”
In the Politico poll conducted from July 28 to Aug. 12, 64 percent of the 1,445 California voters surveyed said they supported keeping the current system with an independent redistricting commission.
Only 36 percent said they supported returning the power to state legislators.
The poll also surveyed 512 of the state’s public policy influencers. Of those, 61 percent said they supported keeping the state’s current redistricting system, while 39 percent said they supported giving the job to state legislators.
Newsom’s office refuted the results.
“You mean the poll that tested what we are NOT doing (getting rid of the commission!)??” his office posted on X on Aug. 14. “Don’t be fooled by so called ‘experts’ who don’t even ask the right questions! There is STRONG support!”
State voters gave the power of redistricting to a nonpartisan redistricting commission in 2008. The commission meets every decade after the census to propose congressional maps for the state.
Newsom’s plan is aimed at nullifying any Republican gains made by Texas if the state adopts its own new maps ahead of the 2026 elections.
The Texas Legislature convened a special session on July 21 to consider redrawing the state’s congressional districts. Texas was slated to keep its current district maps until 2031, but was prompted to redraw them after the U.S. Justice Department suggested that the state’s Ninth, 18th, 29th, and 33rd districts are unconstitutional.
The Texas Senate passed new redistricting maps on Aug. 12, but the bill is stalled in the Texas House because of a lack of quorum after dozens of Democratic lawmakers on Aug. 3 fled the state to other parts of the country, including California, to delay the effort and call for countermeasures from Democrats nationwide.
President Donald Trump has said Republicans could pick up five seats in the U.S. House if Texas redistricts.
In Newsom’s corner are several organizations, including the California Federation of Labor Unions, the AFL-CIO, Planned Parenthood, Common Cause, and the California Teachers Association.
“California’s unions refuse to stand by as democracy is tested,” said Lorena Gonzalez, president of the California Federation of Labor Unions, AFL-CIO.
Several of California’s Democratic officials, including state Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas and state Senate President Pro Tempore Mike McGuire, have joined the governor’s fight.
“California Democrats will not allow Trump’s Republican Party to rig the system and take permanent control of the U.S. House of Representatives,” Rivas said in a statement. “We are prepared and we will fight fire with fire.”
McGuire accused Republicans of leaving California with no choice but to come up with its own redistricting plan.
“This is not a fight California chose, but it’s a fight California can’t run from,” McGuire said in a statement.
Oppositions
Newsom’s redistricting revenge has also drawn wide condemnation from voter groups, officials, and citizens.
Rep. Kevin Kiley (R-Calif.), who alleged that the governor’s redistricting plan is fraudulent, proposed a bill in the U.S. House in August to ban mid-decade redistricting.
“California voters oppose Newsom’s redistricting sham by a 2-to-1 margin,” Kiley posted on X in response to the poll results.
“He’s written ballot language designed to fool people into thinking Yes means No.”
The congressman’s legislation, if passed, would also put the brakes on Texas Republicans’ plan to redraw the state’s congressional districts.
Jeanne Raya, former chair of California’s first independent redistricting commission in 2010, weighed in on Newsom’s plan, likening it to revenge politics.
“That is not the model of responsible government Californians deserve,” Raya wrote in an opinion piece for CalMatters published on Aug. 13. “It’s not worth us expending millions of taxpayer dollars to gamble that different congressional districts will produce the sought-after change.”
She suggested that Newsom wait and consider a different response to “redistricting warfare.”
The League of Women Voters of California, a nonpartisan voting rights organization, also strongly opposes mid-cycle redistricting for California’s congressional seats. The organization wrote to Newsom and Democratic legislative leaders about its concerns.
“Californians fought hard to take redistricting out of the hands of politicians and put it in the hands of the people to ensure that the people can choose their politicians and not the other way around,” the group wrote. “There is a good reason for that.
“Our independent redistricting process is one of the best tools that we possess to ensure that all communities have a voice—including communities of color and rural communities that have been historically marginalized.”
Redistricting in the middle of the decade could “set a harmful precedent nationwide,” the group stated.
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