Congress
Why Democrats’ New York gerrymander won’t be as aggressive as the GOP’s efforts
ALBANY, New York — With Democrats’ national redistricting calculus now in disarray over Friday’s court order blocking new Virginia maps, party leaders are looking to New York as a prime opportunity to keep pace with Republicans.
But as top Democrats in the Empire State move ahead with their attempt to redraw lines in 2028, they’re also far more likely to pull their punches in the ongoing gerrymandering wars.
The Supreme Court’s decision last week to end a key provision of the Voting Rights Act allows states to break up districts previously drawn to accommodate minority voters. Republicans in states like Alabama and Tennessee are rushing to take advantage by dissolving majority Black districts. In New York — the state where Democrats have the most to gain by drawing new lines — there’s virtually no appetite to respond in kind, underscoring a looming barrier for blue states in the redistricting fight.
“People were walking across bridges and being mauled, and have lost their lives for these rights,” New York Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins said of the VRA. “These laws are there because there has been a real effort to disenfranchise certain people, certainly Black people, from being able to vote. So we want to protect that.”
In the coming weeks, New York lawmakers are expected to begin the lengthy process of approving a constitutional amendment that would let them redraw congressional lines in 2028. If successful, the measure stands to turn a state with 19 Democrats and seven Republicans into one with a 22-4 or 23-3 edge.
Such an outcome is akin to what Republicans pushed through in Texas last summer — but not as extreme as the 9-0 Republican map Tennessee lawmakers drew Thursday by eliminating a Black majority district in Memphis.
In New York, a 26-0 map isn’t plausible. But in a deep blue state where Democrats routinely receive around 60 percent of the vote in statewide races, maps that feature tendrils extending from the Bronx and Brooklyn into the furthest regions of upstate and Long Island are possible. And such a reconfiguration would give Democrats an even greater advantage compared with maps they’ve floated in the not so distant past.
Doing that would require eliminating districts that were protected by the VRA until last week. Those districts include the Brooklyn seat held by House Minority Hakeem Jeffries, who said last month that Democrats need to “fight back with every tool available.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez also emphasized the urgency Democrats are feeling Friday at an event honoring Rep. Jan Schakowsky in Chicago, stressing that the court order blocking new maps in Virginia “puts responsibility — even greater responsibility — to those of us in this room, specifically in New York and in the state of Illinois.”
“We have power here in this room to help balance the scale, and we are now in a national fight in order to do that,” she said. “The decisions we make on the city level, the state level and on the federal level, with our representation is part of a much larger story.”
In practice, though, New York’s Democratic leaders do not appear inclined, at the moment at least, to similarly weaponize the newfound ability to disempower Black voters.
“I don’t think we want to roll back protections for minority communities in New York,” said Senate Deputy Leader Mike Gianaris, who’s led his conference’s redistricting efforts since 2012.
The fact that keeping these districts intact is a core personal political belief for leaders like Stewart-Cousins — and a political third rail for everyone in the state’s Democratic Party — will likely limit how aggressive Democrats approach redistricting.
Consider the electoral math on Long Island, where two Democrats and two Republicans now occupy House seats. Maps floated before the 2022 redistricting process would have squeezed many Republicans into just one district, giving Democrats a narrow edge in three.
Expanding that to a 4-0 advantage would require completely ignoring political and demographic boundaries. And states now have the authority to do that under the Supreme Court’s recent decision. Picture a scenario where Democrats slice up blue districts in Brooklyn and Queens and merge them with the purple and red ones to the city’s east — a serpentine seat joining Bedford-Stuyvesant with the Hamptons, for example.
Drawing lines like that isn’t possible, though, without turning historically Black strongholds like those represented by Jeffries and Reps. Yvette Clark and Gregory Meeks into districts with white majorities — or eliminating the Asian plurality in Rep. Grace Meng’s district, or the Hispanic majority in Ocasio-Cortez’s seat. And doing that is almost certain to draw intense pushback from organizations whose support is needed to win approval for the planned 2027 redistricting referendum.
“It’s really, really important that we are at the table from the beginning of this process so that the parties, as they start to course correct, are not overcorrecting,” said L. Joy Williams, the NAACP New York State Conference’s president.
“Voter disenfranchisement doesn’t require malicious intent,” she continued. “In people’s pursuit of political power, if they are doing it at the expense of voters, that’s a problem, and your course correction could inadvertently disenfranchise more people.”
The first occupant of Clarke’s Brooklyn district was former Rep. Shirley Chisholm, after the seat was created in 1966 through the VRA. That district, and the desire to protect its legacy, drew more attention than any in the state during public hearings before the 2022 redistricting — underscoring how much blowback there would be to splintering it in an attempt to boost Democratic odds in Suffolk County.
But it’s far from the only seat in New York that was kept safe due to the VRA.
As Democrats revisited the maps in 2024, the easiest gerrymander in the state would have been blending the seat then held by former Democratic Rep. Jamaal Bowman with the neighboring one held by Republican Rep. Mike Lawler. Doing so would have paved the way to transforming districts with a 29-point Democratic edge and a 1-point Republican edge, respectively, into two districts with 14-point Democratic advantages.
There were concerns about drastic changes to Bowman’s map, though. Overhauling a district where 60 percent of the residents are minorities could have led to a legal challenge under the VRA. And while that’s no longer the case, Democrats still appear inclined to resist aggressively splitting that seat.
“We believe in democracy,” said Stewart-Cousins. “We’re very concerned that we are in a place where not only do we need to defend against the radical remaking of how we do democracy, but that we’re actually defending the very existence of democracy in a multiracial society.”
—Shia Kapos contributed reporting
President Donald Trump pressured Republican senators to make daylight saving time permanent Tuesday evening, amid stalled progress in the chamber on one of the president’s pet issues.
“This is an issue that Republicans, Democrats, and Independents can unite behind,” the president wrote in a Truth Social post. “I am asking Republican Senators to release their holds, and allow the hotline to clear on the Republican side.”
The bill, which would end the bi-annual changing of the clocks observed in most states, passed the House in July despite protests from members of both parties. The president has dedicated significant personal attention lobbying for the bill, and has claimed that the vast majority of Americans support such a change.
But the effort has faced an uphill battle in the Senate, with multiple GOP senators expressing doubts about the change. Senate Majority Leader John Thune has opposed previous efforts to tack on the added hour of sunlight in the evening year-round, and Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) — another member of Senate GOP leadership — has also long opposed the change.
The issue has found supporters in Florida lawmakers, whose state chief moneymaking industries — tourism, recreation, restaurants and golfing — stand to benefit from the change. But lawmakers from agriculture-heavy states have been wary of pushing back sunrise an hour later for farmers, while others have said they fear the potential risks more darkness in the morning would pose for mental health, public safety and sleep habits.
Trump, however, touted the benefits such a change would bring Tuesday: He said it would “Decrease Robbery and Murder Rates, Reduce Car Accidents (especially those involving Pedestrians!), Lower Risk for Cardiac Issues, Stroke, and Seasonal Depression, Make It Safer for Children to Walk Home from School, Increase Time with your Family,” among others.
GOP Rep. Max Miller insisted in a BLN interview Tuesday that he will continue to seek reelection to his Ohio House seat as he battles domestic abuse allegations, comparing himself to President Donald Trump in refusing to yield to calls to step aside.
“People have asked me, what are you going to do? Are you going to drop out of this race? Are you going to resign? You know, are you going to get out before the deadline?” Miller told interviewer Jake Tapper. “And my answer to you, Jake, is no.”
“No one has told me to get off the ballot, and that’s because they know I can win this seat,” he added.
Miller is facing claims of abuse from his ex-wife, Emily Moreno, the daughter of Ohio Sen. Bernie Moreno. Miller has denied any wrongdoing, including accusations that he poured hot water on Emily Moreno and held a gun to her head.
But the accusations — and Bernie Moreno’s decision to go public Sunday with a denunciation of Miller — have thrust his House race into the national spotlight ahead of a deadline later this week to replace him on the ballot.
The White House is privately pushing for Miller to drop his bid for reelection over fears that his candidacy could cost Republicans an otherwise safe seat, according to four people granted anonymity to discuss private conversations.
Miller said Trump told him Monday morning that “it’s going to be a tough race” but did not explicitly ask him to end his campaign. Before being elected to Congress, Miller worked as an aide to Trump’s 2016 and 2020 campaigns — and Miller said he compared the president’s races then to his current race.
“I reminded him of the same resilience that he had when people told him that he was going to struggle in 2016, and he became the 45th president of the United States,” Miller said in the interview. “And I have the utmost confidence that my constituents back home know me. This race is a home race. This isn’t about what the national media thinks.”
He told Tapper at another point that Trump in 2016 “faced the most extreme allegations in the world that hit him day after day after day, and people in the media, very much like yourself and others, said that he would have no shot at winning.”
“But guess what?” Miller said. “He stayed in and he was resilient.”
Miller continued to attack Bernie and Emily Moreno for lying about what he described as “politically motivated” allegations. Spokespeople for Bernie Moreno and Emily Moreno did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Miller also said that Speaker Mike Johnson, who has been publicly silent, is privately “standing behind me.” A spokesperson for Johnson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The House Ethics Committee said earlier Tuesday it would investigate the claims against Miller, shortly after the lawmaker said he would ask the panel for a probe that he said would clear his name. Besides the domestic violence allegations, the committee said it would look at possible “illegal drug use.”
Asked about that allegation by Tapper, Miller said he has not used illegal drugs in “several years.” He attributed reports of needles he had to testosterone replacement therapy.
“The last time I had illegal drugs would have been, I don’t know, several years ago,” he said. “I mean I don’t have a time frame on it. … I don’t use illegal drugs.”
Amid an ongoing tiff with President Donald Trump, Senate Majority Leader John Thune recently joked that public service might be losing its thrill.
“If he could find somebody else to do this job, it might be a big relief,” he told reporters last week after Trump declined to voice confidence in Thune as Senate GOP leader.
But Thune said in an interview that he, for now, anticipates continuing his three-decade congressional career by seeking reelection in 2028.
“My assumption is, going in, that I am,” he said last week after he was asked when he would make a decision about a fifth Senate term representing South Dakota.
But he also left open the possibility things could change as he deals with a mercurial president, a precarious political environment for Republicans and questions that have bubbled up within corners of the GOP about whether he would pursue reelection.
“You know, every election has an impact on that, so we’ll see how it comes out in November,” he added, before reiterating that “the assumption” is that he will run.
Thune’s early assessment of his 2028 plans come as he fights to win elections set to take place this year — the midterm contests that will determine if Republicans keep the Senate majority and the subsequent closed-door, secret-ballot leadership elections that will determine if he remains top leader for another two years.
Thune, according to most GOP senators, is secure in that job, even as Trump sowed doubt in an Oval Office gaggle last week when he was asked about his views of Thune’s leadership.
“We’re going to find out, and I’ll let you know,” said the president, who has repeatedly pushed Thune to pass legislation, the SAVE America elections bill, that does not have the votes to advance.
Even before the latest back-and-forth between the two men, private speculation has swirled around the Capitol about whether Thune might decide to give up his Senate seat just a few years after realizing his long-fought dream of leading the Senate GOP.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if John Thune has had enough,” said one GOP senator who added that “no one would blame him” if he decided to retire in 2028. Like others quoted in this story, the senator was granted anonymity to speak candidly.
Two other Senate Republicans, who both claimed no special knowledge of his intentions, predicted that Thune would retire in 2028. Another GOP senator accused Thune’s right-wing critics in the GOP of trying to use the SAVE America Act controversy to drive down his popularity back in South Dakota, while another Republican chalked any talk of retirement up to “gossip and speculation” versus credible information coming from inside Thune’s orbit.
That’s not to say that Thune isn’t mindful of the obstacles he could face should he choose to seek another term. One is the possibility that Trump could endorse against incumbents in 2028 as he has this year, essentially driving Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana and John Cornyn of Texas out of Congress.
The 2028-cycle Republican thought to be most at risk is Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, but Thune in the interview jokingly acknowledged his own potential vulnerability.
“I mean, if it were today, he probably — I’d probably be on that list,” he said with a laugh.
Speaking about 2028 incumbents generally, Thune said that while Trump’s endorsement “makes a huge difference … a year from now, we could be in a totally different political footing than where we are now, and the world could look a lot different, so it’s hard to say” what effect the president might have.
Without prompting, Thune also made note in the interview of his state’s history for high-profile Republican retirement announcements. President Calvin Coolidge, he recounted, traveled to South Dakota in 1927 and announced there he would not seek reelection to a second full term in 1928.
“I’m not hinting that that’s something impressive that I might follow,” he added.
Some Senate Republicans are openly encouraging Thune to run again.
His GOP delegation mate, Sen. Mike Rounds, described Thune’s standing in South Dakota as “positive.”
“You’ve got two things: You’ve got social media out there, which is driven by a lot of outside sources and some real whack jobs,” Rounds said. “And then you’ve got normal people that see John, respect him, know him, and know what he’s all about — and those are the people that vote.”
“If he decides to run again, and I hope he does, if he does, [the] people of South Dakota will support him,” he added.
Michael Card, a professor emeritus at the University of South Dakota, predicted that Thune would have to spend more time back in the state but that he was in “good shape” if he decides to run for reelection.
“As long as he is seen as pushing the farm bill forward, I don’t think there will really be any real strong candidate,” he added. “And even if they were a strong candidate, they wouldn’t be as strong as John … who knows everybody.”
It’s not the first time fellow Republicans have wondered privately about Thune’s future.
Frustrated by Thune’s lack of support for his efforts to challenge the 2020 presidential election, Trump backed a primary challenge to Thune ahead of the 2022 midterms. After Thune made comments to the Black Hills Pioneer in December 2021 that his wife wanted him back home and he was seriously considering retirement, GOP senators made a crash lobbying effort to convince him to run for reelection.
Thune decided to run, no credible primary challenger emerged, and he earned nearly 70 percent of the vote in the November 2022 general election.
Thune and Trump repaired their relationship in the lead-up to the 2024 election, with Trump staying out of the race to choose Mitch McConnell’s successor as Senate GOP leader. The two worked closely last year to pass Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” and confirm hundreds of presidential nominees — including by changing the chamber’s rules to approve them faster.
But the two men’s relationship has since seen public splits as Trump has applied a single-minded focus to passing the SAVE America Act — including by nuking the filibuster, something Thune claims is off the table for most Senate Republicans.
Trump told reporters last week that his relationship with Thune was “fine” and that they have a “good relationship” even as Trump hammered him to “get his job done” and pass the GOP elections bill. Some GOP senators have privately predicted that Trump will continue to ramp up the pressure on Thune, though they believe how far he goes will depend on what happens in the midterms.
Some online conservative activists have floated the idea of trying to recruit a 2028 primary challenger for Thune. But the South Dakota Republican Party rejected an attempt earlier this summer to censure Thune over his “failure in regards to the SAVE America Act.”
Thune told reporters Tuesday he had spoken to Trump earlier in the day about “issues that he cares about.”
“I wouldn’t say I’m isolated, no,” Thune said, while adding that he has “been very clear about the prospects for the SAVE America Act.”
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