Democrats created new power trifectas across the country thanks to the party’s blue wave, sweeping control of state governments and enabling them to redraw more congressional maps in their favor before the 2028 elections, should they choose to do so. Democrats added at least five states where they will control both legislative chambers…
Page B52From§Eachthe evening edition — 5 November 2026
GOP's mid-decade maps backfire into a dummymander, leaving Democrats holding the pen.
As it ran on the front
Here lies a strategy that Texas and Missouri Republicans built in 2025 to survive 2026, and that the ballots and the bench spent the fall taking apart one piece at a time. Missouri's second map went down for the third time at the courts on September 25, when the Supreme Court's own conservative majority let a lower ruling against it stand. Lawmakers then asked voters directly with Proposition A; voters said no Tuesday, the fourth rejection and the first by ballot instead of bench. Texas took the quieter route, and its map died the same day, buried by the very district it had been drawn to protect.
Two days later Brian Kemp looked at all of it and declined the invitation to try the same play in Georgia. He had already spent September fielding diesel-tax pressure from Keisha Lance Bottoms, the Democratic Senate contender trailing Jon Ossoff — not from Mike Collins, the Republican he endorsed for the seat himself. A governor with that much on his plate did not need a fifth rejection with his name on it.…
…(cont) Thursday put the question on the wire that the architects of the whole project have no tally for yet: how many of the maps they drew to hold the House will net them fewer seats than the lines they replaced. CBS News asked it outright — whether the mid-decade redistricting push had turned into a dummymander, a map so aggressively drawn for one side that a modest swing flips it to the other. The same morning, the Washington Examiner counted the other side of the ledger: Democrats came out of Tuesday with at least five new trifectas, full control of the governor's mansion and both chambers, in states where they did not have it before. Nothing stops them from picking up the same pen before 2028. The Examiner's own morgue, ten days earlier, had already logged incumbents of both parties adjusting campaigns to maps drawn by legislatures, approved by voters, or imposed by courts — proof the tool outlives whichever party last held it.
The strategy is survived by the Texas district it was drawn to protect, which it did not. It is preceded in death by the Georgia governor who watched it fail and took the hint. In lieu of flowers, the next legislature holding the pen — of either party — might run the map past a judge before the ballot, not after.
“They spent a whole legislative session gerrymandering themselves a map, and the voters still said no — that's not a conspiracy, that's a receipt. Now the same trick's sitting on the Democrats' desk in five new states, and nobody up there's promising they won't use it either. The pen doesn't care who's holding it; the only thing that stops it is somebody telling the truth about who's actually in the district.”
“Redistricting's a normal part of the process, both sides do it, nothing to see here — the maps just happened to need redrawing the one year we needed the seats, pure coincidence of timing. And sure, Missouri voters rejected it outright and the Supreme Court let the ruling stand three separate times, but that's really more of a messaging issue. Did I just call Proposition A a messaging issue? That's not — forget I said that.”
Earlier in this story
- Texas and Missouri redraw maps to dodge voters, voters redraw them back; Georgia's governor takes the hint. By Mort · the morning edition, 4 November 2026
- The clause Justice drafted only for a Republican's narrow loss now describes Tuesday's results exactly. By Mort · the morning edition, 4 November 2026
- Republicans redraw Texas and Missouri maps to survive 2026, voters and districts vote no. By Mort · the morning edition, 4 November 2026
- Court rejects noncitizen-voter ballot purge four times, approves it on Election Day. By Mitch · the evening edition, 3 November 2026
- DOJ's four Alaska ballot probes yield zero charges, earn Marc Elias a target letter anyway. By Mort · the evening edition, 3 November 2026
- Justice Department answers five court losses by charging 63 voters, seeking sanctions on its own analysts. By Mitch · the evening edition, 3 November 2026
The receipts
Republicans undertook a historic effort to redraw several states' Congressional districts mid-decade in an attempt to maintain control of the House.
· Here are the candidates facing new maps after redistricting fight from the morgue, 26 Oct 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.