US court blocks Texas from using newly redrawn voting maps

A US federal court has blocked Texas from using its redrawn voting maps in the 2026 midterm election.

The decision - which is likely to be appealed before the Supreme Court - said evidence indicates the new districts were "racially gerrymandered".

Republicans in the state legislature took the unusual step this year of redrawing their voting maps in the middle of the decade. The move was a bid to boost Republican chances of winning congressional seats in Washington.

It sparked a chain reaction as both Democrat and Republican-led states redrew their own maps to give their parties an advantage next year, when the balance of power in the House of Representatives is up for grabs.

The 2-1 ruling in Texas on Tuesday orders the state to set aside the newly approved maps, and instead use the ones created in 2021 by the Texas legislature.

"The public perception of this case is that it's about politics," US Judge Jeffrey Brown, a Trump appointee, wrote in the decision.

"To be sure, politics played a role in drawing the 2025 Map. But it was much more than just politics. Substantial evidence shows that Texas racially gerrymandered the 2025 Map."

The maps voted through in August by the Texas legislature, and approved by the state's Republican governor, create five new Republican-leaning districts.

California voted to redraw its own maps earlier this month, leading to the creation of five Democrat-leaning seats.