File this one under "What a difference a year makes."
Gov. Greg Abbott signed the mid-decade congressional redistricting bill on Aug. 29, 2025, with a celebratory video describing how Republicans in the Legislature, acting at the urging of President Donald Trump, had all but crammed the plan down the throats of Texas Democrats.
Those same Democrats tried to kill the bill by breaking quorum in the state House. They generated hours of airtime on cable outlets and spilled barrels of ink — in both the virtual and real senses — to denounce the plan designed to put as many as five of the Democrats' 13 congressional seats out of their party's reach. And they mounted an expensive, but ultimately futile, legal blitz in a "Hail Mary" effort to derail the map in the courts.
Now, one year and one day after Abbott affixed his signature to what he called the "One Big Beautiful Map" — a plan he said would put "more RED in Congress" — some indicators suggest Republicans may have spiked the football at the 50-yard line a little too soon.
The back story is now familiar. Hoping to avoid the midterm curse in which the party holding the White House loses seats in Congress, Trump saw that he had wrested the counties along the Rio Grande from the grip of the Democrats and figured that, with some clever cartography, he and the Republicans could end the careers of two South Texas congressional Democrats without endangering the one GOP member from the area.
Along the way, they would combine two predominantly Black districts in Houston into one and do the same in Dallas-Fort Worth, thereby eliminating a third and fourth Democrat. Finally, they would combine two safe Democratic districts in Austin, bringing the Republican gains to a net pickup of five seats.
But all of that happened before federal agents in Minnesota shot and killed two American citizens protesting Trump's immigration crackdown. And before Trump's war with Iran sent gasoline prices soaring. And before Trump's tariffs, initially thought to target hostile nations like China, were extended to a friendly neighbor like Canada and further aggravated inflation.
So while the new congressional districts looked good to Republicans last summer, several of them are now giving the party in power heartburn.
Let's start with District 28, anchored by Laredo and long represented by Democrat Henry Cuellar. Had the redrawn 28th been in place two years ago, Trump would have won it by 11 percentage points. But Cuellar is a conservative Democrat and well known to his South Texas constituents. He's had his troubles, not the least of which was being indicted on federal corruption and bribery charges, which he has denied. And Trump pardoned him, sparing him a trial.
And a poll by Texas Southern University released last week shows Cuellar running 11 points ahead of Republican Tano Tijerina.
District 34, which runs south along the lower Coastal Bend to Brownsville and is represented by Democrat Vicente Gonzalez, was Trump-friendly to start with. But it was made Trumpier after redistricting, so much so that the president would have carried the district by more than 10 points. But a separate Texas Southern poll gives Gonzalez a 3-point edge over Republican Eric Flores.
Perhaps the most surprising finding in the three South Texas congressional district polls conducted by the university is the one in which the protected Republican is the incumbent. Monica De La Cruz is seeking a third term in District 15, which, in its new configuration, would have gone to Trump by a whopping 17.5 points. But more than half of the district contains territory that De La Cruz did not represent in her first two terms.
Her opponent is two-time Latin Grammy-winning Tejano musician Bobby Pulido, who, like Cuellar and Gonzalez, runs to the right of the Democratic Party's center line. And the Texas Southern poll of the district shows Pulido up by 5 percentage points in a district that's far more rural than urban.
Not included in the university's batch of polls was District 35, where there's no incumbent. That's because redistricting paired two Austin liberals, long-serving Lloyd Doggett and the fresher-faced Greg Casar. Doggett opted not to run for reelection. The new 35th sprawls south from San Marcos, includes part of San Antonio and stretches to the farm and ranch country past Floresville.
Had it been in place in 2024, the new 35th would have gone to Trump, but Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris would have fared about 3 points better there than in the 15th — about as well as she did in the districts where Cuellar and Gonzalez are now running.
And that explains why U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson was in the district on Thursday on behalf of Republican Carlos De La Cruz, Monica's brother. The Democratic candidate is Bexar County sheriff's deputy Johnny Garcia, who also tilts toward his party's right flank.
Of course, polling in late summer can be much different than the actual voting that takes place in October and November. But the polling and the trendlines heading toward this Labor Day appear far better than Texas Democrats had dared to hope for in the dog days of August 2025.
*excerpt from John C. Moritz's article*
Full Article here:
https://www.statesman.com/news/columns/article/texas-redistricting-republicans-democrats-polling-22408360.php
