by Melissa O’Rourke
Democratic Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson on Tuesday blocked his party’s effort to redraw congressional maps, halting plans to target the state’s only Republican lawmaker.
In a three-page letter to his Democratic colleagues, first obtained by Politico, Ferguson said he would not support holding a special session to redraw the maps and warned that a mid-cycle redistricting effort would be “catastrophic.” Despite controlling the governor’s office and holding supermajorities in both chambers, Democrats cannot advance a redistricting plan without Ferguson’s support.
“If one seat is the difference between whether or not we are standing up to Donald Trump, then we’ve lost from the beginning,” Ferguson told reporters on Tuesday, according to The Washington Post.
Rep. Andy Harris, chair of the House Freedom Caucus and the state’s sole Republican in Congress, has been the target of the redistricting push, backed by Gov. Wes Moore and state House Speaker Adrienne Jones.
In his letter, Ferguson referenced Maryland’s 2021 Democratic map effort, which aimed to eliminate Harris’s seat but was struck down by a judge. He warned that rushing mid-cycle changes could face similar legal challenges.
“In Maryland, 31.5% of registered voters are registered Republicans,” Ferguson noted. “We do not know how a court would assess a revised midcycle map and whether the court would use party affiliation as a measure.”
Ferguson also drew a parallel between partisan redistricting and racial gerrymandering.
“It is hypocritical to say that it is abhorrent to tactically shift voters based on race, but not to do so based on party affiliation,” Ferguson wrote. “As we weigh the risk and grounds for mid-cycle redistricting in Maryland, it is important to acknowledge the jurisprudence and work of many to create racially fair maps.”
“Despite deeply shared frustrations about the state of our country, mid-cycle redistricting for Maryland presents a reality where the legal risks are too high, the timeline for action is dangerous, the downside risk to Democrats is catastrophic, and the certainty of our existing map would be undermined,” Ferguson added.
He also wrote that in “state after state, leaders are considering redrawing congressional maps in the middle of the decade to disenfranchise minority party voters: not
because the census changed – not because population shifted – but because political winds did. The result of this has been an all-out attack on the Democratic Party and the core of democracy.”
Ferguson’s office did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
Maryland’s redistricting debate comes amid a nationwide scramble from both parties, with President Donald Trump encouraging Republican-led states to redraw districts in their favor ahead of the 2026 elections. Texas, Missouri and North Carolina have already approved new maps, which could give the GOP a combined gain of seven seats in the midterms.
Meanwhile, Democrats are pursuing their own redistricting efforts.
In California, voters will decide in November whether to transfer mapmaking authority from the state’s independent commission to the Legislature. If approved, the move could add up to five Democratic seats, shrinking the state’s already small Republican delegation to just four of 52. Virginia Democrats are also seeking to redraw maps to gain up to three additional seats.
In Illinois, however, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries has faced strong resistance from state Democrats over his push to redraw their already heavily gerrymandered congressional map.
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Melissa O’Rourke is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation. Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network and contributed to this story.
Photo “Senator Bill Ferguson” by Senator Bill Ferguson.
The post Maryland Democrat Refuses to Go Along with Party’s Gerrymandering Push first appeared on The Arizona Sun Times.