Indiana House GOP advances 9-0 congressional map, sending plan to state Senate

Indiana's state House on Friday passed a new congressional map that aims to make all nine of the state's U.S. House districts friendly to Republicans, after months of contentious debate and pressure from the Trump administration.

The bill passed in a 57-41 vote and now heads to the GOP-controlled state Senate, which is reconvening on Dec. 8. A number of vocal Republicans in the Indiana Senate have held out against redistricting, although it's unclear if they are enough to prevent it from passing.

On Wednesday, state Sen. Kyle Walker, one of the GOP holdouts, announced he would not be seeking reelection. Two other Republicans in the chamber who are not seeking reelection, Sens. Eric Bassler and Greg Walker, have also said they are opposed to redistricting.

The contentious process among Indiana legislators had led to numerous bomb threats and swatting incidents against officials, state police said.

Republican state Sen. Jean Leising, who opposed the redistricting effort in the state, said in a social media post Sunday that she was the target of a pipe bomb threat. She called the threat the "result of the D.C. political pundits for redistricting," and added, "I will not cave."

The measure moved forward Monday through the Indiana House elections committee, with one Republican joining all four Democrats on the committee in opposition. Eight Republicans voted in favor.

For months, the White House had been pushing Indiana, a state that Mr. Trump won by 19 points, to redraw its congressional map to try to edge out the two Democrats in the U.S. House. Mr. Trump, Vice President JD Vance and other members of the administration met several times with Indiana Republicans to persuade them to redraw the map.

Indiana Gov. Mike Braun called the legislature to reconvene for a special session in November to consider redistricting. But Senate President Rodric Bray insisted that the votes weren't there, and when the legislature convened, they simply agreed to meet again in January for the regular session.

Before announcing that lawmakers would convene after all, Bray acknowledged in November that "the issue of redrawing Indiana's congressional maps mid-cycle has received a lot of attention and is causing strife here in our state."

Mr. Trump and his allies stepped up threats on Republican holdouts in the legislature, with Mr. Trump calling some out by name on social media and promising they'd face primaries.

Republicans and Democrats across the country have been scrambling to undertake mid-decade redistricting, a practice that was rarely undertaken until this year. With the GOP holding a slim majority in the U.S. House and facing down a historical trend that midterm elections tend to favor the party opposing the president, Mr. Trump first turned to Texas. There was historical precedent: Texas conducted mid-decade redistricting during the Bush administration, which was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2005.

Texas' GOP-led legislature reconvened in the summer to redraw the state's maps to net up to five seats for Republicans. In response, California Gov. Gavin Newsom pushed forward with a ballot measure known as Proposition 50 to redistrict his state to net up to five seats for Democrats, since California requires voter approval of its congressional map. Prop 50 passed on Election Day with more than 64% of the vote.

Missouri and North Carolina's Republican legislatures have redrawn their maps in an attempt to gain a new seat in each state for Republicans. Meanwhile, Maryland Democrats have suggested they could undertake a similar effort to edge out the state's one Republican House member, though the idea has faced resistance from some Democratic legislators.

The redistricting campaigns have drawn lawsuits in some states. The Supreme Court on Thursday allowed Texas to use its newly drawn congressional map for now, halting a lower court ruling that found the new map was racially gerrymandered.

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