'Chance this backfires': GOP nervous as Trump goes full speed on redistricting gambit

Months ago, when President Donald Trump urged Texas to redraw its congressional maps in a manner that — he said — would hand Republicans an additional five seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, he launched what has become a sweeping mid-decade redistricting push spanning more than a dozen red and blue states.

Trump has pressed additional GOP-led states to join Texas in mid-decennial redistricting — a rare exercise given that congressional districts, per the U.S. Constitution, are reapportioned based on each decade’s census. But now, some Republicans are expressing anxiety over this all-out effort.

“Worried Republicans say basing redistricting on the 2024 election is a sizable leap,” The Washington Post reported, “both because Trump’s coalition has not shown a willingness to show up when he isn’t on the ballot and polls show Trump is hemorrhaging support from key groups in his unique coalition.”

Republican operative Annalyse Keller told Meet the Press Now, “I am not confident that that Trump coalition in a midterm election is going to stay with Republicans.”

“There might be a chance that some of this backfires,” Keller added.

Trump’s poll numbers are at their lowest of his second term, and Democrats in some races have shown they are outperforming 2024 election numbers. The electorate is changing, and some groups that moved over to Trump in 2024 have already begun backing away in 2025.

“At the heart of these concerns are Latino voters, who are central to the Texas redistricting plan and were expected to be key to whatever Republicans decide to do in Florida,” the Post reported. “Trump made inroads with Latino voters in 2024, especially with Latino men, which helped propel him to victory in key battleground states. But Trump’s standing with Latino voters has fallen off a cliff in recent months.”

The Post cited a November Pew Research Center survey that “found 70 percent of Latinos ‘disapprove of the way Trump is handling his job as president,’ and 61 percent said ‘Trump’s economic policies have made economic conditions worse,’ a notable finding because the economy was a primary reason 43 percent of Latino voters backed Trump in 2024.”

Pollster and former advisor to Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 presidential campaign, Matt A. Barreto, told the Post: “So if someone is redistricting and they are trying to draw Republican performances based on Trump-Harris characteristics, they are going to be wrong in 2026, because 2025 has already shown us this.”

Redrawing congressional maps in an effort to pick up GOP seats can make solid Republican districts more competitive.

Indeed, the Post reported that “Republicans are moving Republican support from GOP-friendly districts to make these new districts lean more toward the GOP, effectively making former stronghold districts more competitive — the opposite, say these Republicans, of what a party should do ahead of an election that is expected to go against them.”