🔗 Share this article High Court Approves Newly Drawn Texas Congressional Electoral Boundaries. Through a per curiam decision, the highest judicial body has allowed Texas to use a redrawn congressional district plan that could add up to five new conservative-tilting districts. The 6-3 decision, handed down on Thursday, approves a request by the state to set aside a federal judge's injunction that had rejected the new map in November. Court's Reasoning The federal judge improperly inserted itself into an ongoing primary campaign, creating considerable confusion and upsetting the delicate federal-state balance in elections, the supreme court said in detailing its decision. The district court had previously found that Texas had likely sorted voters by their race – a practice known as unconstitutional racial sorting – when it adopted the redistricting plan. It had instructed the state to employ the boundaries drawn after the most recent national count for the next year's election. Stinging Dissenting Opinion With a sharply worded dissenting opinion, Justice Elena Kagan took issue with the majority's action. She argued that it disregarded the work of the district court, noting that its decision was written by a judge nominated by former President Donald Trump. We are a higher court than the district court, but we are not a better one when it comes to making such a fact-based decision, Kagan argued in a dissent supported by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson. She continued, This court's stay ensures that Texas's redistricting plan, with all its increased favoritism, will control next year's elections. And it ensures that many Texas residents, unjustly, will be sorted in electoral districts due to their race. And that result, as this court has stated repeatedly, is a violation of the U.S. Constitution. National Redistricting Fight This decision comes amid a national battle over the redistricting of electoral maps. Texas is an essential part in campaigns to reshape the U.S. House map to protect a narrow Republican majority. Usually, redistricting takes place after a decennial population count. Yet the decision by Texas Republicans to initiate a brazen mid-cycle redistricting earlier in the summer sparked a chain reaction among other states. Conservative legislators in including North Carolina and Missouri have also approved new maps that might create several additional GOP-friendly seats. The opposition, for their part, have countered with revised boundaries in including California and Virginia, which could offset those projected gains. Political Responses Lone Star State AG praised the High Court's decision. In a release, he said the order protected Texas's prerogative to draw a map that secures representation aligned with the GOP. We are setting the precedent for restoring our country, through each electoral district and individual state, he stated. In contrast, opposition party officials decried the decision. The Court's approval of this extreme, racially gerrymandered Texas GOP map is profoundly disappointing, said the leader of a major party campaign committee. A top Democratic figure argued the court had yet again eroded its credibility by upholding a racially gerrymandered map. This decision from the Court's far-right bloc proves extremists are willing to rig elections. The Texas map is a discriminatory power grab targeting Black and Latino voters, he concluded.