Congress

Democrats make a Trump-inspired U-turn on redistricting

Published

11 months ago

August 8, 2025

The last time House Democrats held the majority, they made a sweeping package of good-government reforms — including an attempt to end partisan gerrymandering — a centerpiece of their legislative agenda.

“The people should choose their politicians,” then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in 2021, moments before the House passed the bill that would later die in the Senate. “Politicians should not be choosing their voters.”

Now, as President Donald Trump pushes Republicans in red states to redraw congressional district lines to their benefit, some Democrats are abandoning their past push for reforms. Instead, they’re cheering on leaders like California Gov. Gavin Newsom who say their party must fight fire with fire.

Pelosi, in a statement to Blue Light News, said she backs Newsom’s effort to overrule a bipartisan California map and counter GOP attempts to “rig the elections in their favor.”

Her U-turn is emblematic of the larger rethinking underway within the Democratic Party, where leaders who once embraced anti-gerrymandering initiatives and feared a race to the bottom in partisan warfare between red and blue states are now increasingly willing to set aside their lofty goals — at least temporarily.

It’s another facet of the dilemma that’s vexed Democrats since Trump first won the presidency. They’ve tried to present themselves to voters as “adults in the room” willing to set aside partisanship for the public good. But now that they’re being confronted with a potential existential threat to regaining power in 2026 or beyond, they’re entertaining bare-knuckle tactics.

That includes some groups who have long advocated for high-minded changes to the political system, such as the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, a group founded in 2017 by former Attorney General Eric Holder.

“This organization is taking a posture that we’re not going to oppose states taking corrective and temporary measures,” said its president, John Bisognano.

And it’s happening in the House, too, where the reform agenda promoted under Pelosi has fallen by the wayside. While Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and members of his leadership team continue to advocate for voting rights advancements and other key policies, they’ve not made them central to their opposition to Trump and his Republican allies in Congress.

Rep. Joe Morelle (D-N.Y.), the top Democrat on the committee overseeing federal elections, called Trump an “anomalous figure” requiring an emergency response — including when it comes to gerrymandering.

“I will be an advocate for continuing to try to create national standards, but until those national standards are agreed to by everyone, I think it’s going to make it increasingly difficult for states to continue to engage in a more nonpartisan system of redistricting,” he said in an interview. “As with so many things, Donald Trump shatters the norms and the standards that we have lived for, and as we try to improve our democracy, he is just shattering it. We have no choice but to respond in kind.”

The rethinking has been prompted by Texas Republicans’ decision to respond to Trump’s push to launch an unusual mid-decade redrawing of congressional lines in a special legislative session called last month by GOP Gov. Greg Abbott. The effort is now on hiatus with Democratic state lawmakers having fled the state to deny Republicans a quorum in protest of what they see as a partisan power grab.

Other Republican-controlled states such as Missouri, Ohio and Indiana could follow Texas’ lead and rework their own congressional maps to shore up the three-seat House GOP majority ahead of next year’s midterm elections.

Confronted with claims of partisan overreach, Republicans gladly point to Democratic states that have drawn their own gerrymanders. Illinois’ 14-3 map in a state where Trump won 44 percent of the vote has been excoriated by good-government advocates. New York’s move to sidestep an independent map ended up in the courts and threw the 2022 midterms into chaos.

Democratic Rep. Mike Quigley, asked by a Blue Light News reporter Thursday at an event in his hometown of Chicago, said he is “aware that our maps in Illinois are gerrymandered.”

“Look, in an ideal world, these maps are drawn by nonpartisan commissions, and they represent what the Constitution said we should do,” he said. “We’re not there yet. … So you can’t be a Boy Scout in a situation like this — you have to be as tough as they are.”

Enter Newsom, who has triggered the effort to expand Democrats’ advantage in California by overriding the map and sifting as many as five seats away from Republicans — which could entirely offset the Texas redraw.

The effort has rekindled the war over redistricting inside the Golden State, which has been done by an independent citizens commission since a successful 2010 ballot initiative. Before the vote, Pelosi and other prominent California Democrats — including then-Rep. Adam Schiff, then-state Sen. Alex Padilla, who are now both U.S. senators — opposed stripping line-drawing power from elected officials and backed a measure to maintain state lawmakers’ control.

Foes of independent California redistricting, like Pelosi, tried to persuade voters it wasted tax dollars on unaccountable bureaucrats. But their opponents countered that officeholders were motivated to protect their turf.

“Elected officials don’t like to change the system that got them elected unless they can be super sure about what comes out of that and that they’re going to be okay,” said Eric McGhee, a Public Policy Institute of California expert who has written extensively about redistricting.

Only later did California’s most prominent Democrats embrace independent redistricting as a national matter. Now, they’re back on familiar ground, defending their party’s right to undertake its own power play in the face of GOP efforts elsewhere.

“While we continue to support enacting legislation to create nationwide independent redistricting commissions, Democrats must respond to Republicans’ blatant partisan power grab,” Pelosi said in her statement. “Democrats cannot and will not unilaterally disarm.”

Her fellow House Democrats don’t have any remorse about the political capital spent trying to pass the voting rights legislation in previous Congresses, though some are wistful about their failure in light of their current predicament.

Both their sweeping campaigns-and-elections package, dubbed the For the People Act, and a narrower measure aimed at restoring the 1965 Voting Rights Act, named after the late Rep. John Lewis, ran headlong into the Senate filibuster and now have zero path to passage under the GOP trifecta.

“This is an example of why we need it,” said Missouri Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, whose Kansas City–area district could be redrawn by the state GOP in the coming weeks.

Quigley said that Democrats should continue “pushing and advocating” for national redistricting standards, “educating the public of where we can be and why it matters” — even as they pursue their own partisan lines.

Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, also argued for reviving Democrats’ voting bills in a future Congress and for eventually going even further by implementing multi-member congressional districts and ranked-choice voting.

But he acknowledged the reality of the situation Democrats face.

“I would rather fight fire with water and put gerrymandering out of business,” he said. “But if the Republicans are going to plunge us into a race to the bottom, then we have to fight back with every means at our disposal.”

Shia Kapos, Nicole Markus, Jeremy White and Liz Crampton contributed to this report.

Congress

Moderates beware: Mamdani coalition portends a dramatically different Democratic Party in NYC

Published

3 hours ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

NEW YORK — A coalition powered by Mayor Zohran Mamdani expanded the left’s reach Tuesday, winning younger voters across racial and ethnic lines and once again upending conventional wisdom about elections in New York City.

A series of hotly contested congressional and state elections pit a slate of Mamdani-backed democratic socialists and progressives against establishment candidates who, in several cases, differed little on policy aside from U.S.-Israel relations.

The results were staggering.

Midterm election cycles in deep-blue New York City tend to be sleepy affairs. Both this year and in 2022, just over 500,000 people cast ballots, less than 20 percent of eligible voters. But turnout within a congressional district spanning Upper Manhattan and the Bronx increased by roughly 50 percent between 2022 and Tuesday, with more than 66,000 voters heading to the polls.

In another seat covering parts of Brooklyn and Queens, turnout more than doubled from 2022, though state and federal elections were held on different days that year and the seat was not competitive, which would have reduced the number of voters going to the polls.

Congressional candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America were able to replicate the mayor’s success by winning younger Latino voters in Brooklyn and a majority of Black voters in Harlem. Combined with the DSA’s base in relatively wealthy neighborhoods, the result charted the far left’s broadening appeal and a potential reorientation of the electorate that will influence races for years to come.

“This was a big wave for DSA and they did a good job capitalizing on it,” said Evan Roth Smith, a pollster with Slingshot Strategies. “The question now is: Was this a wave cycle that will abate, or is it the start of the takeover?”

Much of Mamdani’s base is concentrated in the so-called “commie-corridor,” a series of neighborhoods along the Brooklyn-Queens waterfront filled with young, educated and affluent voters who’ve propelled several DSA candidates into office. They went gaga over Mamdani’s candidacy and, as Tuesday’s results show, will turn out for candidates he supports.

The area was crucial to Assemblymember Claire Valdez’s crushing 56-38 defeat of Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso.

“The factor that felt most significant to me were all of these New Yorkers who got activated and politicized in the mayor’s race last year who were looking for the next fight,” said Andrew Epstein, a political adviser to Mamdani who worked on Valdez’ campaign. “Those people didn’t go away. And they want to keep going.”

Valdez also won several heavily Latino areas that were expected to break for her opponent.

Reynoso was born in Brooklyn to Dominican parents and just a few years ago was a City Council member representing Bushwick, a long-gentrifying Brooklyn neighborhood that’s home to Latino families and young hipsters. Valdez was born in Texas, moved to New York City in 2015 and served in the state Assembly for just one term before launching her Mamdani-backed bid for retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez’s seat.

She ended up winning areas of Bushwick by even greater margins than the total results — in some election districts winning upwards of 80 percent of the vote.

“You don’t win the district by 35 points if you don’t have broad advantages across age and demographic groups,” said Michael Lange, an election analyst and Mamdani supporter who has tracked several contested races with extreme granularity. “Is she blowing him out of the water with Hispanic voters under 50? I see tons of evidence that the answer is yes.”

The age advantage was the common thread across several other races.

In Upper Manhattan and the Bronx, for example, younger Black voters in Harlem were key to Darializa Avila Chevalier’s win over Rep. Adriano Espaillat, the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus who had built a small political empire in the district.

While gentrifying, the neighborhood remains a seat of Black political power and is home to younger households who tend to rent. That particular demographic is a strong indicator of why Mamdani won the area in 2025, even as he lost the Black vote overall to former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose support was concentrated among older Black homeowners in Brooklyn and Queens.

While Espaillat never healed a rift with the Black community in upper Manhattan opened during his election in 2016, which contributed to his weak performance, Avila Chevalier demonstrated Tuesday that a significant share of voters there were not just supportive of Mamdani the person, but of the broader political movement he’s now leading.

Overall, she edged out Espaillat with Black voters 48-46, according to an analysis from The New York Times, which charted demographic breakdowns for several contested races.

Three winning congressional candidates endorsed by Mamdani — including former city Comptroller Brad Lander in Brooklyn, who unseated incumbent Dan Goldman — share several similarities. They won younger, college-educated and wealthier voters by huge margins, in several cases by 30 points or more, and lost lower-income voters to incumbents or candidates affiliated with incumbents — a sign that the movement seeking to boost struggling New Yorkers has not won them over.

While the DSA was able to win three state races without the support of Mamdani — a testament to the organizing prowess of the left that was essential to reactivating the mayor’s coalition — there were limits to the city’s leftward shift.

Rep. Grace Meng won her reelection race, though she only vanquished challenger Chuck Park by 14 points, an uncomfortable margin for an incumbent of her stature. Park, who ran to Meng’s left, was boosted by a huge turnout in Woodside, Queens, a multiethnic neighborhood that went heavily for Mamdani in last year’s mayoral race.

Elsewhere in the Bronx, however, incumbents remained strong. Rep. Ritchie Torres handily won reelection with 72 percent of the vote, though it was a low-turnout affair more consistent with an uncompetitive midterm. Nevertheless, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries touted the results — even as he watched a series of his endorsed candidates fall to the DSA in Brooklyn, his home borough, in a preview of the intraparty battles to come.

“In some higher-income districts, there was an outsized focus on the Middle East. In other districts, for instance, in the South Bronx, Ritchie Torres ran against somebody who was heavily critical of his position on Israel, and he won by fifty points,” Jeffries told MS NOW on Wednesday.

Congress

Divisive Israel vote to be discussed on Sunday House Democrats call

Published

4 hours ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

An anticipated vote on cutting off U.S. military aid to Israel is among the subjects House Democrats are slated to discuss on an unusual teleconference Sunday evening.

Six people granted anonymity to describe private caucus plans confirmed the member call, which has not been publicly announced. Two of them said it would involve an amendment that would block aid to Israel and other appropriations matters.

Democrats are likely to be sharply divided on an amendment drafted by Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) to a fiscal 2027 spending bill funding the State Department and foreign aid programs. Massie is proposing to end Israel aid and cut the overall foreign military aide program by $3.3 billion.

House Republicans have not yet announced a vote on that bill, but two other people granted anonymity to describe GOP planning said it is likely to be added to the floor schedule next week. The House Rules Committee voted last week to set up debate on Massie’s amendment.

Senior Democrats want to talk through member concerns and strategy on the Sunday call, according to one of the six people.

The call comes just days after three outspoken critics of U.S. aid to Israel swept hotly contested House primaries in New York City, ousting two incumbents.

Meredith Lee Hill and Riley Rogerson contributed to this report.

Congress

House panel subpoenas Leon Black, escalating tactics in Epstein investigation

Published

5 hours ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Oversight Committee slapped Leon Black with two subpoenas in the middle of his transcribed interview about his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein — after Black refused to answer questions about potential non-disclosure agreements he had with women tied to the late, convicted sex offender.

Oversight Committee Chair James Comer announced the issuance of the subpoenas — for the NDAs and for Black to reappear for a formal deposition July 16 — after the first hour of Black’s interview had concluded with the billionaire investor insisting he would not discuss the terms of those agreements.

Black had initially agreed to appear voluntarily, but under the terms of a deposition, his testimony will be videotaped and under oath.

“We believe that information is vital to our investigation,” Comer, a Kentucky Republican, told reporters Friday. “We want to know, was Jeffrey Epstein involved in the NDAs? … Was he involved in awarding [of] funds to the women for the NDAs? What was the reason for the NDAs?”

Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), the top Democrat on the panel, seconded Comer’s decision to force a deposition to compel information that he also described as central to the panel’s ongoing Epstein probe — a rare moment of bipartisanship in an investigation that has been plagued by partisan bickering.

“There’s no question that as soon as this interview started, that the witness was not going to answer critical questions,” he told reporters.

After Black had already departed from the closed-door interview, his lawyer, Susan Estrich, said that Epstein “had no involvement with any NDAs, whether they exist or not,” and said her client has never abused a woman.

“They made a premeditated political decision to serve him with subpoenas after less than an hour of questioning, and before they even asked a single question about his legitimate payments to Epstein,” she said, referring to members of the Oversight panel. “This was nothing more than a planned political stunt.”

Estrich represented the late Fox News chairman Roger Ailes when he was facing sexual misconduct accusations. Black has also battled his own allegations of sexual assault, though he has denied the accusations — along with having had knowledge of Epstein’s wrongdoing over the course of their relationship.

Several Democrats who attended the interview were aghast at Black’s lack of cooperation. Rep. Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico told reporters that more than one of Epstein’s accusers had previously accused Black of committing sexual misconduct against them, too.

“Before Mr. Black left the interview, he admitted that he lived close to Epstein,” Stansbury said. “He often dined at his house. He went over for breakfast, for happy hours, attended impromptu dinners with world leaders, with academics, with scientists.”

Rep. Suhas Subramanyam (D-Va.) alleged that Black “gush[ed] poetically about how smart and how great Jeffrey Epstein was” and accused him of walking out on the committee.

The bipartisan desire to get more information from Black comes as the committee’s Epstein investigation is set to hit the one-year mark in July, after Oversight Committee Democrats — frustrated with the Justice Department’s refusal to release the so-called Epstein files — forced a bipartisan vote to facilitate the publication of relevant materials.

That vote jumpstarted a congressional probe that has led to interviews with more than a dozen witnesses, including ex-Attorney General Pam Bondi, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Bill and Hillary Clinton and Bill Gates.

Comer has also asked acting Attorney General Todd Blanche to speak with his panel in the coming weeks, after Bondi accused him of being at the tip of the spear in overseeing the eventual release of the Epstein files in compliance with a law Congress passed in December.

Members will have more to ask Blanche following the Justice Department’s admission on Thursday that the DOJ had been violating the law Congress passed last November requiring the public release of the vast majority of government records relating to Epstein.

A federal judge gave Blanche one week to release certain names and other information that DOJ initially redacted from the millions of pages of the Epstein files — or provide a more detailed explanation for withholding them.

Critics believe the department has been seeking to protect powerful people implicated in Epstein’s crimes — including potentially President Donald Trump, who has not been charged with wrongdoing and has denied misconduct.