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In a per curiam decision, the highest judicial body cleared the way for Texas to use a newly configured congressional district plan that could add several five additional GOP-friendly districts. The six-to-three order, issued on Thursday, grants a request by the state to overturn a federal judge's injunction that had rejected the new map in November.

Court's Reasoning

The district court erroneously placed itself into an ongoing primary campaign, creating much confusion and upsetting the sensitive federal-state balance in elections, the justices wrote in justifying its decision.

The district court had previously found that Texas had likely grouped voters based on their race – a practice known as racial gerrymandering – when it passed the new maps. It had instructed the state to revert to the maps established after the 2020 census for the next year's election.

Strong Dissenting Opinion

Through a sharply worded dissenting opinion, Justice Elena Kagan objected to the court's decision. She contended that it undermined the work of the lower court, noting that its opinion was crafted by a judge appointed by ex-President Donald Trump.

We are a higher court than the district court, but we are not a better one when it comes to making such a fact-based decision, Kagan stated in a dissent co-signed by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson.

She continued, Today's ruling solidifies that Texas's redistricting plan, with all its increased political tilt, will govern next year's elections. And it ensures that many Texas residents, unjustly, will be grouped in electoral districts due to their race. And that result, as this court has stated repeatedly, is a infraction of the constitution.

Countrywide Redistricting Fight

The ruling comes amid a nationwide fight over the remapping of electoral maps. Texas is an essential part in efforts to reshape the U.S. House map to bolster a slim Republican control. Usually, boundary revision occurs after a ten-year survey. Yet the action by Texas Republicans to initiate a aggressive off-cycle redistricting earlier this year sparked a series of events among other states.

GOP lawmakers in states like North Carolina and Missouri have also approved redistricting plans that could add a number of additional conservative seats. Democratic lawmakers, meanwhile, have countered with new maps in including California and Virginia, which might neutralize those projected gains.

Political Reactions

The Texas top lawyer welcomed the supreme court ruling. In a comment, he said the order defended Texas's fundamental right to draw a map that ensures electoral outcomes supportive of the GOP. Texas is paving the way as we take our country back, district by district, state by state, he stated.

In contrast, Democratic officials criticized the ruling. The Court's approval of this extreme, racially gerrymandered Texas GOP map is profoundly disappointing, said the chair of a major Democratic campaign committee.

A leading House figure stated the court had another time damaged its legitimacy by upholding a racially gerrymandered map. The ruling demonstrates a willingness to subvert democracy. This Texas plan is a partisan, racially biased scheme to undermine voter will, especially in communities of color, he stated.