Former President Obama supports California's redistricting efforts

Kaitlyn Schallhorn, The Orange County Register on Aug 20, 2025

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

Former President Barack Obama is in favor of California’s redistricting plan.

The former president threw his support behind the effort while the state legislature continues to advance bills to convene a special election in November, when voters would decide whether to implement congressional maps for the next three elections.

“Over the long term, we shouldn’t have political gerrymandering in America, just a fair fight between Republicans and Democrats based on who’s got better ideas,” Obama said in a post on X.

“But since Texas is taking direction from a partisan White House and gerrymandering in the middle of a decade to try and maintain the House despite their unpopular policies, I have tremendous respect for how Gov. Newsom has approached this,” the post continued. “He’s put forward a smart, measured approach in California, designed to address a very particular problem at a very particular moment in time.”

Gov. Gavin Newsom kicked off California’s redistricting campaign with a rally in Los Angeles last week.

The governor has touted the partisan gerrymandering as a way to counter similar redistricting efforts in Republican-led states, including Texas, where President Donald Trump has said his party is “entitled to five more seats.”

Republicans, meanwhile, are vastly opposed to mid-cycle redistricting in California. GOP legislators filed a lawsuit with the state’s Supreme Court earlier this week, asking it to intervene and halt continued work in the legislature on the redistricting bills.

The proposed legislation says redistricting would only be triggered if “Texas, Florida, or another state adopts” new congressional maps between now and January 2031 that are not mandated by a federal court. It also calls for a special election in November where voters would have the final say on whether to implement the partisan maps for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections.

Meanwhile, the Republican-controlled Texas House on Wednesday gave initial approval to a redistricting plan that is meant to shore up extra seats for the GOP.

_________