The justice department on Thursday joined a lawsuit brought by California Republicans to block the state’s new congressional map, escalating a legal battle over a redistricting effort designed to give Democrats a better chance of retaking the House of Representatives next year.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in California, challenges the congressional map championed by Gavin Newsom, the state’s Democratic governor, in response to a Republican gerrymander in Texas, sought by Donald Trump. The justice department’s intervention in the case sets up a high-profile showdown between the Trump administration and Newsom, one of the president’s chief antagonists and a possible 2028 contender.
“California’s redistricting scheme is a brazen power grab that tramples on civil rights and mocks the democratic process,” said Pam Bondi, the US attorney general. “Governor Newsom’s attempt to entrench one-party rule and silence millions of Californians will not stand.”
Democrats have expressed confidence that the newly approved maps will withstand a legal challenge.
“These losers lost at the ballot box and soon they will also lose in court,” Brandon Richards, a Newsom spokesperson, said in a statement.
Republicans brought the lawsuit the morning after California voters decisively approved the redistricting measure, known as Proposition 50, which suspended the maps drawn by the state’s independent commission and installed new House districts designed to help Democrats secure up to five GOP-held seats. It was the most significant counterpunch by Democrats in the unprecedented redistricting war that began in Texas and spread across the country as Trump attempts to secure House Republicans’ fragile majority for the final years of his second term.
The plaintiffs assert that California’s map improperly used race as a factor to heavily favor Hispanic voters in violation of the US constitution. It asks a judge to block California from taking effect.
“Race cannot be used as a proxy to advance political interests, but that is precisely what the California General Assembly did with Prop 50,” Jesus Osete, the second-highest ranking official in the Civil Rights Division, said in a statement, quoting from the lawsuit. “Californians were sold an illegal, racially gerrymandered map, but the US Constitution prohibits its use in 2026 and beyond.”
The plaintiffs are being represented by the Dhillon Law Group, which was founded by Harmeet Dhillon, who is now assistant attorney general overseeing the US Department of Justice civil rights division. The firm also represented California Republicans earlier this year in their unsuccessful attempt to prevent the special election from taking place.
Dhillon has been recused from this case, the justice department said.
Unlike elsewhere, where Republican state legislatures have enacted gerrymanders, California’s plan required voter approval, which it received last week, with nearly 65% of the vote.
“It is a shame that the hacks at the highest levels of the justice department are more intent on overturning the results of a free and fair election in California and eliminating the voting rights of communities of color in Texas and Louisiana than they are on releasing the information they fear in the Epstein files,” Eric H Holder, Jr, the attorney general of the US and Chairman of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee (NDRC) in a statement.
“Unlike the scheme imposed on the citizens of Texas, Californians just overwhelmingly voted in favor of the state’s new congressional map by nearly 30 percentage points at the ballot box to fight back against Trump’s gerrymandering scheme. That resounding rejection by the people clearly terrifies many Republicans and the Trump White House – it’s no wonder they are now resorting to hypocritical, desperate and truly absurd lawsuits while at the same time continuing to beg Republicans across the country to gerrymander, all in an effort to circumvent the will of the people.”
Democrats need to flip just a handful of Republican-held House seats to take control of the chamber in next year’s midterm election. The party that holds the majority will shape the final years of Trump’s second term in the White House, determining whether a unified Republican Congress will continue to deliver on his agenda or whether he will be met with resistance, investigations and possibly even a third impeachment attempt.
