California’s independent redistricting commission has received generally good reviews for its new maps that voters are using to elect legislators and members of Congress in November. 

Voters who say they are disenfranchised want similar panels to draw their local districts — and they’ve gone to the Legislature to make that happen.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is a political enigma. The Harvard and Yale-educated attorney has accomplished what numerous conservative politicians — among them Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), and fellow-Floridian Marco Rubio — have tried and failed to do in the wake of Donald Trump’s takeover of the Republican Party: position himself as the ultimate insider with the outsider cred to consolidate the MAGA base. 

The Florida Supreme Court declined to weigh in on the congressional map drawn by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, leaving new district boundaries that have been criticized as discriminatory against Black Floridians in place ahead of the midterm elections.

The map — which DeSantis forced the state Legislature to approve — gives Republicans as many as four additional House seats in Congress. A number of advocacy groups challenged the map in state court in April, saying it violates anti-gerrymandering provisions in the state Constitution.

Republicans are vowing to spend record amounts in key state supreme court races this fall, seeking to take advantage of a favorable national political environment to elect conservative judges at the state level amid deep political divisions.

A string of decisions throwing out Republican-drawn congressional maps in Ohio, North Carolina and Pennsylvania has intensified the party's determination to install justices who could give lawmakers fresh opportunities to muscle through more advantageous maps.

With new maps for the next decade of elections finalized in Maine, election officials are urging voters to make sure they are up-to-date on any changes.

Maine has an independent redistricting commission made up of an equal number of Democrats and Republicans and an independent chair, and they finalized both the congressional and legislative voting district maps last fall.

It may get the most attention, but partisanship is not the only way to measure how fair the country’s new congressional maps are. Equally important is how well they represent communities of color. And on this front, the congressional lines that will be used in the 2022 election leave a lot to be desired.

A three-part series by Dan McLaughlin in National Review surveys the prospects for gerrymandering reform following a year in which Democrats, rather than Republicans as widely predicted, appear to have gained ground overall in the redistricting process. McLaughlin nicely lays out the history of partisan dynamics on this issue, offers an effective critique of Democrats’ chief bills in Congress, and has some supportive words for what I agree is the best reform path.

For years, America’s congressional map favored Republicans over Democrats.

But that may not remain the case for long.

In a departure from a decades-long pattern in American politics, this year’s national congressional map is poised to be balanced between the two parties, with a nearly equal number of districts that are expected to lean Democratic and Republican for the first time in more than 50 years.

A pair of cases are currently pending before the Supreme Court that could fundamentally rewrite the rules of US elections.

Both cases are redistricting cases. In Moore v. Harper, the North Carolina Supreme Court struck down gerrymandered congressional maps drawn by the state’s Republican legislature. In Toth v. Chapman, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court selected a congressional map for the state after its Republican legislature and Democratic governor deadlocked on what that map should look like.

A new survey finds a majority of Americans oppose partisan gerrymandering, even as many remain unaware of how redistricting works in their own states.

Two-thirds of Americans told pollsters for The Economist and YouGov that states drawing legislative districts to favor one party is a “major problem” with just 23 percent saying it’s a “minor problem.” But 50 percent said they do not know whether districts are drawn by the legislature or an independent commission in their own state.