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Which states could get new congressional maps in 2024?
An updating tracker of developments in midcycle redistricting.
After the 2020 census, each state redrew its congressional district lines (if it had more than one seat) and its state legislative districts. 538 closely tracked how redistricting played out across the country ahead of the 2022 midterm elections. So everything is done and dusted, right?
Not so fast, my friend. More than a half-dozen states face the prospect of having to go through the redistricting process again, mostly due to federal and/or state litigation over racial or partisan gerrymandering concerns. Both Democrats and Republicans have the opportunity to flip seats in districts drawn more favorably than they were last cycle. For example, Democrats appear poised to pick up at least one seat in Alabama and could theoretically get more favorable maps in Louisiana and Georgia. Republicans, meanwhile, could benefit from more favorable 2024 maps in North Carolina and New Mexico.
We’ll be using this page to relay major developments in midcycle redistricting, such as new court rulings and district maps, and examine how they could affect the political landscape as we move deeper into the 2024 election cycle. We’ll predominantly focus on congressional maps, but will share the occasional key update on conflicts over state legislative districts.
Some key states to watch:
Where things stand in Louisiana
It’s unclear whether Louisiana will end up with a new congressional map ahead of the 2024 election. Like Alabama, Louisiana has faced litigation over claims that its district lines impermissibly diluted the influence of Black voters. In 2022, the GOP-controlled legislature implemented a map that maintained the state’s status quo of one majority-Black seat among six total districts. But Democrats and voting rights advocates argued that Louisiana, which has a population that’s about one-third Black, should have a second district in which Black voters could elect the member of their choice. A lower federal court agreed, ruling in June 2022 that the map violated the Voting Rights Act and ordering the state to draw a new map. The legislature appealed, but the Supreme Court put the Louisiana case on hold while deliberating over the similar redistricting case in Alabama. This allowed Louisiana’s map to be used in the 2022 election.
But a redraw of Louisiana’s map became a renewed possibility after the Supreme Court ruled in June 2023 that Alabama’s congressional lines violated the VRA. Following that decision, SCOTUS lifted its hold on the Louisiana case. Nonetheless, the case remains up in the air following a late September decision by a federal appeals court that canceled the lower court’s next hearing in early October, in which it was expected to approve a remedial map for Louisiana after the state failed to propose an alternate map in 2022. The plaintiffs have asked the Supreme Court for emergency relief to block the appeals court’s decision, arguing the appeals court ruled improperly and in a way that could delay the potential implementation of a new map beyond 2024. In the meantime, the appeals court’s decision gives Louisiana more time to defend the current map and consider new lines.
Where things stand in New Mexico
The New Mexico Republican Party sued over the state’s congressional map last year, arguing that the Democratic-controlled legislature drew a gerrymander that violates the state constitution. Under the old lines, the state had two fairly safe Democratic seats and one relatively GOP-leaning seat. But in 2021, Democrats implemented a new map that made all three seats more competitive, but also gave each seat a Democratic lean. In the case of the GOP-leaning 2nd District, the new lines shifted the seat so that it took in Democratic-leaning and heavily Hispanic parts of Albuquerque. Not coincidentally, Democrats went on to flip the seat by a narrow margin in 2022, giving them control of all three of New Mexico’s congressional districts.
The map’s future will hinge on a three-part test the New Mexico Supreme Court laid out for this case, which asks whether the main reason for drawing a district was to entrench a party’s power by diluting the votes of the opposition party, whether the map substantially diluted the opposition party’s votes and if the defendants have a legitimate, nonpartisan reason for the lines. A lower state court held hearings in late September, so it may be some time before the case is decided.
Where things stand in New York
New York redistricting is … complicated. If the state’s map is redrawn, it could be the most consequential redistricting action of the 2024 cycle and could endanger the reelections of several Republican representatives.
New York’s current congressional map was drawn by a special master after a state court struck down the Democratic legislature’s preferred map, which was severely biased toward Democrats. Democrats filed a lawsuit against the replacement map, arguing that it should only be temporary and that the state’s advisory redistricting commission should be entitled to take another crack at drawing the map. What they don’t mention is that, if the commission fails to pass a map, the Democratic legislature would once again step in and draw one instead — likely another gerrymander.
In July, a state court ruled that the commission should indeed redraw the map, but Republicans quickly appealed the decision. The New York Court of Appeals will hear the case in November. Although that’s the same court that threw out the Democratic gerrymander just last year, the author and swing vote in that 4-3 decision is no longer on the bench.
Where things stand in North Carolina
North Carolina’s Republican-controlled legislature looks ready to draw lines for a new congressional map this month in the latest twist in the state’s long history of sharp-elbowed partisan battles over redistricting. Prior to the 2022 election, the GOP-led legislature passed two different maps that would’ve been highly favorable to Republicans, but in each case state courts threw out the maps as partisan gerrymanders. The state ended up with a court-drawn map that would only be in effect for the 2022 election, which resulted in a 7-7 split in the state’s congressional delegation.
But in the 2022 election, Republicans won a 5-2 majority on the North Carolina Supreme Court, which undid the Democrats’ narrow advantage and significantly altered the state’s legal environment for redistricting. In April, the state Supreme Court overturned a 2022 ruling made by the previous panel that said partisan gerrymandering violated the state constitution, opening the door for the legislature to draw an advantageous map for Republicans. Under state law, the governor has no veto power over redistricting measures, so Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper cannot interfere in the GOP-led legislature’s line drawing. If the legislature’s initial mapmaking effort in 2021 is any indication, we can expect Republicans to shoot for a map on which the party stands a good chance of winning at least 10 seats.
Where things stand in Florida
Part of Florida’s congressional map could also change due to litigation over racial discrimination. Under the state’s old lines, a majority-minority 5th District with a plurality-Black population had stretched from Tallahassee to Jacksonville that regularly sent a Black Democrat to Congress. However, under pressure from Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, the Florida legislature drew a map that dissolved the old 5th, leaving only majority-white and solidly Republican seats in northern Florida.
In early September, a lower state court ruled that the map violated the state constitution because it had diminished the ability of Black voters to elect a candidate of their choice. In some ways, the ruling wasn’t a shock because the state had agreed in court proceedings that the map ran afoul of the state’s anti-diminishment provision. But the state argued that provision should be unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment, signaling a conservative line of argument against voting rights protections that could appear in future state and federal cases.
While unsuccessful in lower court, the state’s argument might find more receptive judges higher up the Florida judicial ladder. Although a state appeals court will consider the case first, it will likely end up in front of Florida’s Supreme Court. And the high court could decide for the state, especially because DeSantis’s five appointments to the court’s seven seats have made it much more conservative. In the meantime, civil rights groups have launched a second track of litigation in federal court, where they argued in late September hearings that the map violated the 14th and 15th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.