Texas House approves GOP congressional map after two-week delay from Democrats' walkout

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Texas Tribune

Aug. 20, 2025
Updated: 5:24 PM Central


The Republican-led Texas House on Wednesday gave preliminary approval to a new congressional map crafted to hand five additional U.S. House seats to the GOP over fierce opposition from Democrats, who cast the plan as a racially discriminatory attempt by President Donald Trump to stack the deck in next year’s midterm election.

The House tentatively adopted the map, 88 to 52, on party lines, and was expected to grant its final approval later on Wednesday. A Senate panel advanced a similar map Sunday; the full chamber was expected to send the new lines to Gov. Greg Abbott’s desk later this week.

Republican lawmakers are pursuing the unusual mid-decade redistricting plan, which has set off a national map-drawing war, amid pressure from Trump to protect the GOP’s slim majority in Congress. The effort comes just four years after the Legislature last overhauled the state’s congressional map following the 2020 Census.

Democrats in the Texas House staged a two-week walkout over the plan in a bid to stall the map’s passage and rally a national response among blue states, where lawmakers could launch their own retaliatory redistricting efforts. The roughly two dozen Texas Democrats who returned to Austin on Monday said they were starting the next phase of their fight: putting the screws on their Republican colleagues and establishing a record that could be used in a legal challenge to the map.

Read more: https://www.texastribune.org/2025/08/20/texas-house-vote-congressional-map-redistricting-democrats-trump/

[Lovie777]

1. GQP .....................

Texas latinos are not too happy with them.

[LonePirate]

2. This was pre-ordained when the Texas House Dems returned to the state despite what some ostriches believed recently.

[Keepthesoulalive]

3. They did the best they could

Give them respect for trying. The people of Texas voted for this, blame them. Let’s back our representatives because people who voted for republicans did this. Stop expecting democrats to save us from self inflicted wounds.

[question everything]

6. Why? Did they have to return?

[Keepthesoulalive]

7. Perhaps they needed to feed their families

They have day jobs and the courts were not helping.

[LeftInTX]

8. I have no idea. The group is probably too diverse with different needs.

They only needed 5 to return to restore quorum.

They were being fined $500 per day.
Their pay was stopped.
The AG of Texas also shut down their source of fundraising.

In a nutshell: They each needed $500/day, but they could not fundraise and they were not getting paid. So they needed to be independently wealthy or something.

[KPN]

21. If in fact it was about financial survival, if almost all of the billionaires were progressives as

opposed to conservatives or even moderates, perhaps they would have had the financial support to ride the full period out, and then the next session if needed. But they are not.

I don’t much like the phrase, but I’m beginning to believe it fits:

Eat the billionaires!

[Skittles]

18. because they have LIVES

[Torchlight]

5. It was pre-ordained when mr trump instructed the TX gop what to do

I'm not going to blame smoke and mirrors.

[Abstractartist]

4. Dems fail

Sorry, but unless blue states do the same thing, the democrats are failures. Sorry, but this party needs to really, truly examine it’s priorities… which are YOUR CONSTITUENTS….. WE ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT PRIORITY IN THIS GOP SHIT TAKEOVER.

I can only hope Governor Newsom means what he is saying. I can also hope any other blue state follows suit, (if able).

[Keepthesoulalive]

9. How much did you donate

They don’t make money being state reps. I f you want a functioning democracy the American people must vote in every election. Blame the people of Texas for voting in people who use them and discard them so they can maintain power.

[Bengus81]

12. They get paid in Texas for being a State rep,but of course they have real jobs too.

They get $7200 per year plus 230.00 or so per diem for each day they are in session.

[Keepthesoulalive]

14. That's not even poverty wages

Child care if you have children and travel to and from the capitol. Beto was raising money and a judge stepped in to stop him. The people of Texas own this, it’s up to them to vote right. Stop criticizing dems for the republicans being lap dogs of trump.

[Abstractartist]

22. I will not

I will not stop the criticism at all. This is not just a Texas republican problem, but a lack of urgency in the democrat party in not undercutting the false and corrupt narrative messaging the republicans do so well.

With the complete and utter disregard for democracy and humanity by this administration, the democrats should have a cakewalk into the next election.

The urgent pushback, is just not present. We, the voters should not be the only voices in this. We, the voters are doing our party leadership’s work for them. Our protests, our texts, our conversations of Release The Epstein Files, Save Medicaid, We pay for our Social Security, etc. should be echoed in town halls, diners, school auditoriums every day. We have a few outstanding and outspoken representatives leading the effort, but just a few.

Fight Fire With Fire. Stop bringing a box of cookies to a gunfight. Our country truly needs the democrats to retake all 3 areas of our government, and it starts by making sure we retake the house anyway we can. If that means doing what Texas is doing, in the blue states, then do it.

[Keepthesoulalive]

32. It is the Democratic Party

Ultimately it is the people of Texas that have decided republicans are great. Deadly floods , ice storms and the governors response to Uvalde, a corrupt attorney general and things that would make thinking and feeling people vote for an armadillo before they would vote for a republican . There are no cakewalk elections in the United States because Americans are hopelessly brainwashed and selfish. Democrats can hold press conferences, no one will know about it because it will not be covered but if the fat one farts they will tell you he sprayed fancy French perfume. You can blame anyone you choose but the fault is with the American people.

[Bengus81]

30. They recieve about $8K for the session in Kansas plus $166 per day for per diem.

Hardly poverty wage for a 90 day session--that's $2,640 per month plus the per diem. They have a bill in the Kansas legislature to raise that wage to about $43,000 or so for a 90 day session.

That's $14,333 per month,yet Republicans will never vote for a State minimum wage increase,property tax relief etc. That's a ridiculous amount for 90 days.

[rickyhall]

10. Texas Bowing to a Yankee: How Far You've Sunk

[bluestarone]

11. Who knows, maybe it will workout for Democrats.

That would be nice.

[Bengus81]

13. It was always going to end this way BUT they put a lot of light on their illegal gerrymandering

If not for all of them who stood tall that shit Abbott and those Trump humpers are doing would have lasted one news cycle.

[mdbl]

15. If the majority of TX voters had any brains they would vote out all those assholes that did this

But, as we know - they don't

[Deminpenn]

16. You can only gerrymander so much

before you turn "safe" seats into competitive ones. In a wave election like 2026 is poised to be, you not only lose the new districts but the old "safe" ones, too.

This is why it's been reported the TX congressional Rs didn't really want this new map.

[Gimpyknee]

24. And yet they all voted for it.

A bunch of f’en lemmings.

[Deminpenn]

38. The Texas Congressional delegation was reported as not liking creating a new map

They had no vote on what the R Texas state legislature did.

[joshdawg]

17. Lie, Cheat, and Steal.......

the only things republican assholes are good at.
effin' bastards!!

[tornado34jh]

19. Well, then it's fair game then if California decides to redraw maps and they can't bitch about it

If California, Illinois, or whoever decide to do it, then they can't bitch and whine about it. You opened a Pandora's Box.

[Gimpyknee]

26. It is not an absolute certainty that California will be able to do the same.

[Torchlight]

29. Who argued otherwise?

[Karasu]

20. All blue states need to join in on what CA is doing, now. Or this will be remembered as the beginning of the (very) end

of what little democracy remains in this country.

[Gimpyknee]

23. It was inevitable.

[CapnSteve]

25. Bashing Texans, calling the GOP stupid is satisfying, but...

...does not move Republican voters to the left.

We have a golden opportunity here. The convict and the entire corrupt, cruel Republican Party, especially here in Texas are driving voters away. Let's pick them up. A 10% nudge tips Texas into the blue column.

[JustAnotherGen]

28. Won't work

I don't believe anyone who voted for Krasnov in 2016, 2020, or 2024 is even remotely concerned about kitchen table issues. They are evil and need to be thrown into the trash bin of history.

And that's where the old way of Democratic Thinking, and/or Leftist thinking falls apart from the base.

The base? We've got nothing to lose. We know what our enemy is and are treating them as such.

Take a look at Rep Crocketts throwing of Gabriel Arce under the bus was triggered by. We aren't playing nice. They need to sit down, shut up, and get out of REAL Patriotic Americans' way.

[Keepthesoulalive]

33. Nothing is going to move republican voters to the left

Other than starvation and then I have my doubts. Why should we worry about their feelings when they don’t give a damn about anyone else. You say you want democrats to fight , then you say don’t fight to hard or you may alienate them. What do you want?

[JustAnotherGen]

27. Cast?

But it is true.

Democrats, who cast the plan as a racially discriminatory attempt by President Donald Trump to stack the deck in next year’s midterm election.

Do better Texas Tribune. Call things what they are.

The disenfranchisement of Black and brown people in Texas.

It's deliberate.

Just like Georgia throwing Black and brown people off of the voting rolls is stone cold racist.

[The Grand Illuminist]

31. Leaving nevers works.

Remember Oregon quorum stopage when the Republicans skipped town?

[Keepthesoulalive]

34. It raised awareness

That is the only way to get around the media blackout.

[The Grand Illuminist]

35. Aparrently awareness doesn't feed the bulldog.

nt

[Keepthesoulalive]

36. What do you want the democrats in Texas to do?

They are a minority in a rigged state. The problem is republicans.

[The Grand Illuminist]

39. Hope for the best, but most urgently PREPARE for the worst.

Keyword: Prepare.

[mike_c]

37. so in the end, all Texas dems had in their toolbox...

...was a PR stunt. Any idiot could predict exactly what happened once the reps congratulated themselves and returned to Texas. If you want a walkout to have any teeth, you have to stay out until you win. It's a strike, not a stunt. Sheesh.