Republicans are set to lose another House seat in the gerrymandering war that President Donald Trump and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott started. On Wednesday, a New York state Supreme Court judge ruled that the state’s 11th Congressional District illegally disenfranchises Black and Latino voters.
The 11th District, centered on Staten Island, is currently held by GOP Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, who—if this ruling holds on appeal—would see her district redrawn in a way that would likely peel off yet another Republican lawmaker.
If Democrats indeed net another seat out of New York, it would give Democrats a needed boost as they seek to offset gerrymanders that have been passed in Republican-led states.
With Democrats netting five seats out of California, one seat out of Utah, and potentially one seat from New York, they are expected to squeeze seven seats from map redraws. And that number could grow further if Virginia voters pass a referendum to suspend the state's independent redistricting commission and allow the Democratic-controlled legislature to redraw their maps—a move that would give Democrats as many as four more seats.
The Tottenville neighborhood on Staten Island.
If all of that happens, Democrats would be poised to pick up 11 seats from mid-decade redistricting alone.
Republicans, on the other hand, have so far netted nine seats: five from Texas, one from Missouri, two from Ohio, and one from North Carolina. That number could grow by two to five if Florida Republicans redraw their maps, as Gov. Ron DeSantis has demanded they do. A new Florida map would also have to survive the courts.
Altogether, Republicans could pick up just a handful of House seats, if any, on net. That’s because Democrats like California Gov. Gavin Newsom are fighting fire with fire.
Beyond redistricting, Trump is in a bad position going into the midterms.
His approval rating is in the gutter, with a poll released Thursday from The New York Times/Siena University finding that the coalition that put him back into the White House in 2024 has completely fallen apart in just one year.
In fact, Trump is in even worse shape with young voters and voters of color than he was in 2020, when he lost the presidential election to Joe Biden.
And Democrats are ahead on the generic congressional ballot, which asks voters what party they want to see control Congress, by a big enough margin to win control of the House.
"Overall, Democrats lead by five percentage points among registered voters nationwide—a tally that would easily be enough for the party to take back the House of Representatives," Nate Cohn, the Times' chief political analyst, wrote. "It’s the largest lead for the Democrats in a Times/Siena national poll since 2020, and it’s similar to Joe Biden’s eventual 4.5-point popular vote victory that year."
As for the New York seat, the ruling will be appealed, making it unclear if the seat will actually get redrawn.
However, for the time being, Democrats like New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries lauded the ruling.
And Republicans whined.
“Despite having a voter registration advantage in New York’s 11th Congressional District, Democrats can’t beat me on merit, policy and debate. So what do they do? They file a meritless lawsuit claiming our district disenfranchises minorities to take out the first minority to represent the district and steal our seat,” Malliotakis wrote in a post on X.
But as Taylor Swift said, “You play stupid games, you win stupid prizes.”
