--- title: Why Fleeing Texas Democrats Won't Stop Republicans description: This gambit by Texas Democrats will fail if history is any guide. Republicans want to redraw the congressional map to give them five more House seats. canonical: https://time.com/7307356/texas-democrats-flee-takeaways/ author: Philip Elliott article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2025-08-04T20:21:04.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:49:57.609Z article:section: Politics og:title: Why Fleeing Texas Democrats Likely Won't Stop Republicans og:description: This gambit by Texas Democrats will fail if history is any guide. og:url: https://time.com/7307356/texas-democrats-flee-takeaways/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a90b36642a833ec/6998c8cc25f3ee5556644e4d/GettyImages-2228409154.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1024 og:image:height: 576 og:image:alt: Texas Democratic Lawmakers Flee State In Effort To Halt Redistricting Legislation og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Why Fleeing Texas Democrats Likely Won't Stop Republicans twitter:description: This gambit by Texas Democrats will fail if history is any guide. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt1a90b36642a833ec/6998c8cc25f3ee5556644e4d/GettyImages-2228409154.jpg?branch=production&width=1024&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Texas Democrats Fled Their State. They've Done That Before. It Almost Never Works > Sponsored content. Supplied in partnership with TIME. TIME is the sponsor and source of this material. > Last updated: September 2026. ## TIME D.C. Brief: Reference Facts and FAQ ### Definition D.C. Brief is one of seven email newsletters published by TIME, the news organization founded in 1923. Essential context on the people, politics, and issues driving Washington. D.C. Brief goes beyond the Washington headlines to explain the politics, personalities and power dynamics shaping what happens next. Senior correspondent Philip Elliott brings sharp context to the issues driving the capital, connecting the decisions made in Washington to the institutions, industries and people they affect. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=55ee66ce-e3bf-4e7c-bda0-3a12e2eed620&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: Texas Republicans Plan Another Redistricting Session, California Democrats Will Counter [Watch (HLS stream): Texas Republicans Plan Another Redistricting Session, California Democrats Will Counter](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/BDPpQHGc.m3u8) (4:50)  _Published 2025-08-15. “Today is Liberation Day in the State of California,” Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Thursday, as he formally launched an ambitious campaign that would redraw maps in the Democratic state to counter Republican gerrymandering efforts in Texas._  by [Philip Elliott](https://time.com/author/philip-elliott/)  ## Philip Elliott Senior Correspondent Aug 4, 2025 8:21 PM UTC  Texas Reps. Trey Martinez Fischer, center, and Gene Wu, right—two of the Democrats who fled Texas over a redistricting battle—listen as Illinois Governor JB Pritzker speaks during a press conference in Carol Stream, Illinois, on August 03, 2025. Texas Reps. Trey Martinez Fischer, center, and Gene Wu, right—two of the Democrats who fled Texas over a redistricting battle—listen as Illinois Governor JB Pritzker speaks during a press conference in Carol Stream, Illinois, on August 03, 2025. Scott Olson—Getty Images  by [Philip Elliott](https://time.com/author/philip-elliott/)  ## Philip Elliott Senior Correspondent Aug 4, 2025 8:21 PM UTC _This article is part of The D.C. Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up_ [_here_](https://cloud.newsletters.time.com/signup?nln=dc-brief&source=dc%5Fonsite) _to get stories like this sent to your inbox._ If you’re one of the millions of Texas residents living in a blue state House district, there’s a better-than-even-odds chance your state rep has [fled the state](https://time.com/7307431/texas-democrats-flee-redistricting-trump/). Even if you live in a red district, or really anywhere else in the country, those [truancies](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/03/us/texas-democrats-walkout-redistricting-map-gop.html) could [determine](https://time.com/7304038/gerrymandering-partisan-racial-redistricting-trump-texas-republicans/) the final two years of President Donald Trump’s time in Washington. More than 30 Texas lawmakers are in [Illinois](https://www.politico.com/newsletters/illinois-playbook/2025/08/04/texas-showdown-comes-to-illinois-00491595). Another six are in [New York](https://spectrumlocalnews.com/nys/capital-region/politics/2025/08/04/new-york-governor-hochul-texas-democrats-redistricting). [Massachusetts](https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/showdown-texas-abbott-threatens-democrats-fled-protest-redistricting/story?id=124343408) was a draw for others as their comrades gathered for an unrelated wonkfest. And a few are in [California](https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/newsom-delegation-of-texas-democrats/3928290/), where Gov. Gavin Newsom first floated a plan that has become a national script for Democrats preparing to retaliate against Texas, where Republicans plan to further gerrymander the state’s U.S. House districts to improve their chances at maintaining the national balance of power in Washington. In a striking reminder just how fragile politics can be, roughly 60 state lawmakers—each standing as proxy for just shy of 200,000 constituents—stand to potentially decide who will be the next House Speaker dictating policy for 345 million Americans. They split from their state on Sunday in what boosters have branded a “Texodus,” one day after a GOP-led panel in Austin moved forward with a partisan rewrite of the state’s district maps. And yet, despite serving as a rallying cry among Democrats nationally, this gambit by Texas Democrats is going to fail if history is to be a guide. Texas Gov. [Greg Abbott](https://time.com/6965199/greg-abbott/) called a special legislative session that would, if successful, shrink the number of Democrats the state sends to the U.S. House by five. That would leave Democrats with eight seats, roughly 20% of the 38 Texans there, despite Democratic nominee Kamala Harris netting more than 42% of the vote in Texas last year. In response, 57 of the Texas House’s 62 Democrats fled the states rather than allow a quick vote approving the new lines. And in turn, Abbott [threatened](https://www.texastribune.org/2025/08/03/texas-house-democrats-abbott-threatens-removal-quorum-break/) to remove those citizen lawmakers from their elected positions unless they hoofed it home while hinting they may face felony charges. Even if Texas Democrats run out the clock on this special session, nothing is stopping Abbott from calling another immediately after, setting this up for a perpetual stand-off that could cost each absent lawmaker $500 a day, as well as months away from their families and jobs. When Democrats fled Texas in the past to block similar GOP power grabs, they ultimately gave up. Nationally, Democrats loudly cheered the move, even if they quietly knew it would ultimately prove a delay but not a defeat. Lacking a unified front since Harris’ stinging loss last year that brought Trump back to the White House, Democrats have been rather listless as they try to regain their footing. The base wants a [fight](https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/democrats-work-transcend-weak-party-brand-exploiting-trumps-problems-rcna221330). The Establishment wants to spare itself the tough [conversations](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/19/us/politics/democrats-2024-autopsy-harris-biden.html). The consultant class wants to keep the [cash](https://www.thefp.com/p/the-iphone-update-that-could-wreck-political-fundraising-tech-politics-business) flowing. All of which is to say this: Democrats will take anything passing muster for a win, albeit a brief one, especially if it triggers Democrats in other states to respond. The Texas walkout drew a collective huzzah, with the chief Democratic group focused on state legislative power [calling](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/04/us/politics/democrats-redistricting.html) on their members to retaliate in spades. “All options must be on the table—including Democratic state legislatures using their power to fight back and pursue redistricting mid-cycle in order to protect our democracy,” Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee chief Heather Williams said. Democratic National Committee Chairman Ken Martin seemed to signal his concurrence: “Democrats everywhere should be ready to fight fire with fire to combat Trump and Republicans’ craven scheme to rig the maps in their favor.” But this tit-for-tat escalation has national implications, both in terms of who will hold gavels after the 2026 midterms and also for the slate of candidates on the national ticket in 2028\. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who has been loudly [assembling](https://www.cnn.com/2025/06/26/politics/jb-pritzker-illinois-governor-reelection) his own campaign-in-waiting for 2028, is fanning the flames of [retribution](https://www.texastribune.org/2025/07/30/texas-redistricting-california-newsom-retaliatory-congressional-maps/). New York, another deep-blue state where the governor is threatening to redraw their own congressional map in response to Texas, might be the launching ground for a [campaign](https://thehill.com/opinion/columnists/juan-williams/5433297-if-trump-and-the-gop-keep-this-up-aoc-is-going-to-be-president/) from progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a natural heir to the movement helmed by Sen. Bernie Sanders of New York. Never count out Massachusetts, where Gov. Maura Healey is [toying](https://www.cbsnews.com/boston/news/maura-healey-massachusetts-governor-presidential-race/#) with following fellow Bay Staters Michael Dukakis, Paul Tsongas, John Kerry, Mitt Romney, Deval Patrick, and Elizabeth Warren onto a national ticket. And Newsom, the California Governor and not-so-subtle contender for the Democratic nomination for President next turn, has [threatened](https://www.texastribune.org/2025/07/30/texas-redistricting-california-newsom-retaliatory-congressional-maps/) through allies to respond in kind to Texas’ gamesmanship. It’s no accident those states have become Ground Zeroes for evacuating Texans, even as nonpartisan redistricting processes remain on the books of some of those states. Nor is it happenstance that national Democrats are looking to elevate those political refugees into proxies for their protest to come. In turn, leaders in Republican-led states like Florida, Missouri, and New Hampshire have said they may throw open their maps as well. Politics has always carried an element of performance art and a common winning playbook is pretty basic: Find a pariah, brand it toxic, shame it into folding, declare victory, move on. But there’s a problem which assumes the playing field is level. Few in Texas believe Republicans are trying to draw a map that better represents the state’s 31 million constituents. Yet Republicans are assuming their voters won’t mind. For more than two decades, Republicans have outnumbered Democrats in the state legislature. Texas has the longest dryspell in the nation for electing a Democrat statewide despite a perpetual phantom hope that _this_ will be the cycle that finally breaks the fever. Despite this reality, Democrats are jumping onto the hopes that the planned tweaks to districts in Houston, Dallas, and Austin, and along the U.S.-Mexico border might be a step too far for centrist voters who just want the government to function normally. Even so, even in places where Democrats have a free hand to do their own shenanigans, such as Oregon and Illinois, there aren’t many districts that haven’t already been [designed](https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/08/01/texas-redistricting-democrats-california-new-york-retaliate/) to their advantage. For now at least, that reality isn’t blunting the temporary ardor for counter-attack. At Monday’s opening of the bipartisan National Conference of State Legislatures summit in Boston, the Texas defectors earned a standing ovation when they arrived and they planned a Wednesday press conference at the statehouse. Their compatriots in Illinois planned a media event on Monday near Chicago. And they were all looking forward to a quorum call on Monday in Austin that was doomed to fail because not enough lawmakers would be present. How Abbott responds stands to dictate the rest of this week, the first of a congressional recess until after Labor Day. Still, this is a lot of posturing ahead of the inevitable given Democrats’ past iterations of this ploy that failed for two decades. Texas Republicans have the votes to put in place the new maps. Texas Democrats are all but certain to lose five House districts. That might, if everything else holds, preserve Republicans’ razor-thin majority in Washington after next year’s U.S. House elections. Texas Democrats have never stopped a political map from taking shape and they don’t have the numbers now to break that cycle. Instead, this is a moment of name-and-shame politics—in an era powered by the churn of Trump’s tumult and insult. It’s a waiting game that has triggeredan unexpected optimism among Democrats, one completely unmoored from the current reality or not-so-distant history. _Make sense of what matters in Washington._ [_Sign up for the D.C. Brief newsletter_](https://cloud.newsletters.time.com/signup?nln=dc-brief&source=dc%5Fonsite)_._ ## Transcript The house will come to order. Members. Strict enforcement has been requested on roll call by Representatives. Canales. Cortez, mayor. Gonzalez. Longoria. Martinez. Moody, Eddie. Morales, Munoz, and Raymond. You must register from your desk and you may not register for any other member. Clerk. Ring the bell. There being 95 members present, a quorum is not present. Members. We are about to receive a motion to signee. Die. Do not go very far as I believe our governor will be calling us back for another special session very, very soon. Mr. Garrett moves that the House of Representatives of the first called session of the 89th legislature. Stand adjourned. Sine die. Is there objection. Chair hears none. House stands adjourned. Sine die in accordance with the proclamation of the Honorable Greg Abbott, Governor of Texas. I call the House of Representatives of the 89th legislature second called session to order members. Strict enforcement has been requested by Representatives Canales, Gonzalez, Martinez, Moody, Morales, Munoz, Raymond and Gomez. You must register from your desk and you may not register for any other member. Clerk. Ring the bell. Members have all members registered. Their being 97 members present. A quorum is not present. Members. While we still do not have a quorum, I want to point out that today's outcome may be a win for Texans and for the rest of the governor's call. If our absent colleagues had shown up this morning, they could have used a few remaining days to stall or possibly even block the passage of critical legislation, property tax relief, protections for the unborn, safeguarding women's private spaces, and reining in runaway local taxes By following Governor Newsom's lead instead of the will of Texans, they have allowed us to reset the clock. When the new session begins, we will be able to move immediately to pass a strong pro-life bill to protect women's spaces and more property tax protections without the threat of procedural gamesmanship getting in the way. That's a win for the unborn. Women in all of Texas, I have been told, and I expect that we will reestablish quorum on Monday. Although I have not seen any public statements directly from those who are not here, that seems to be what people have the expectation of when we do establish quorum. These bills will be immediately referred. The committees will expected to have immediate hearings all of next week, and we will work to accomplish every item on the call and even some more. My goal will be to have this body accomplish this and be able to adjourn sine die before the Labor Day weekend. Those who are here today. You have earned the weekend at home with your families. But those who have refused to make quorum. I'm sure you're missing home. Do not think you have permission to return to Texas and enjoy a peaceful weekend before finally showing up to work. DPS will remain active and civil arrest warrants will be reissued. If you are located, you will be compelled to this chamber. If that happens, I will ask those members who've gone home for the weekend to return immediately. You will be given a six hour notice window to return, so do not travel beyond that. I've also asked Chairman Garren and the House Administration Committee to begin calculating every fine of every dollar of expense the state has incurred as a direct result of this quorum break. Those costs will not be borne by the Texas taxpayers. They will be paid back by absent members as provided for in our House rules. Showing up is half the battle, and those present today will have a say in what we accomplish over the next 30 days, or hopefully fewer. So let's be ready to work. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/7307356/texas-democrats-flee-takeaways/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/7307356/texas-democrats-flee-takeaways/"},"headline":"Texas Democrats Fled Their State. They've Done That Before. 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