Maryland Voters to Decide on Map Favoring Democrats in All 8 Seats

Maryland voters will decide in November whether to clear the way for a new congressional map that would favor Democrats in all eight of the state's U.S. House districts, beginning with the 2028 elections.

Both chambers of the Democratic-dominated state legislature approved putting the amendment on the ballot Tuesday during a special session. Sending it to voters required three-fifths approval in each chamber; it cleared the House of Delegates 96-38 and the Senate 32-13.

Gov. Wes Moore, a Democrat, praised lawmakers and said the step was needed to counter President Donald Trump's push for mid-decade redistricting that favors Republicans.

"I continue to believe that our country needs national redistricting reform. But until that happens, inaction is not an option," Moore said in a statement. "Maryland will not be caught flat-footed while Republicans engage in political redlining that guts decades of progress that the generations before us fought for."

Democrats hold seven of Maryland's eight House seats. Republicans called the effort a blatant power grab and said it violates a new state law meant to give voters more time to weigh proposed amendments.

"Just because we can go ultra-partisan doesn't mean we should go ultra-partisan," Republican Delegate Kevin Hornberger said during House debate. Other Republicans said constituents were not behind it, and one Democratic lawmaker warned that rural areas could lose federal resources if grouped with suburbs. Democrats stressed that the amendment does not approve any specific map.

Redistricting normally happens once a decade, after new Census data. Eight states — Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee and Texas — have redrawn maps to help Republicans, who could gain as many as 16 seats. New maps in California and Utah could give Democrats an advantage in six races.

Maryland moved more slowly, and its plan will not change districts for this year's elections, because state Senate President Bill Ferguson blocked an earlier effort. He feared the state Supreme Court, most of whose members were appointed by a Republican former governor, could strike it down; a judge rejected a Democratic-drawn map in 2022. Ferguson said his view changed after the U.S. Supreme Court weakened the Voting Rights Act in April.

The ballot question would specify that requirements the judge cited — that districts be compact and respect "natural boundaries" — apply only to state legislative districts. That would let congressional districts cross the Chesapeake Bay, the only way Democrats could draw an edge in every seat. The lone district on the Eastern Shore is also the state's only Republican seat, held by Rep. Andy Harris, chair of the House Freedom Caucus.