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Redistricting has been one of the hardest stories to follow this election cycle. At first, Republicans appeared to have a clear advantage. Then Democrats made gains that seemed to offset it. Now, it is clear that Republicans will be the net beneficiaries of the 2026 fight to redraw congressional maps. But the effects of this battle will likely extend beyond the midterms.
Key takeaways
State legislatures traditionally redraw congressional maps after the census, doing so most recently in 2020. After the 2024 election gave Republicans a historically narrow House majority, President Trump urged Republican-controlled states to redraw their U.S. congressional districts again in hopes of staving off the midterm losses that often hit the incumbent president’s party.
Texas was the first state to answer the president’s call. California responded on behalf of Democrats. A series of smaller changes across several states followed, mostly favoring Republicans. Then Virginia approved a Democrat-backed referendum for a new map, briefly evening out the race.
The biggest shift in the redistricting landscape came in late April 2026, when the Supreme Court significantly narrowed Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, opening the door to new congressional maps across the South.
Both Republicans and Democrats have had some setbacks in the redistricting fight. The Virginia Supreme Court struck down the state’s redistricting referendum on procedural grounds, posing a setback for Democrats. And although it first appeared that Republicans may run the table redistricting in the South, they have had some challenges.
In South Carolina, the state Senate rejected a plan to cancel early primary voting and schedule a new primary under a revised map that would have eliminated the sole Democrat in the state’s delegation. In Alabama, a three-person panel of federal judges blocked a new Republican-backed map. However, the Supreme Court overturned the lower court ruling resulting in a map that will likely give Republicans one additional seat.
Clearly, the pace and scale of change have been dizzying. The bottom line is now clear: Republicans are likely to come out ahead in the 2026 redistricting battle.
The Cook Political Report has tracked competitive House and Senate races since 1984. Its archives show how sharply the number of competitive House districts can vary from cycle to cycle.
By historical standards, 2026 looks uncompetitive, though not unprecedented. Cook currently rates 18 House seats as toss-ups, roughly in line with cycles such as 1998, 2002, 2006, and 2014, though far below the 52 toss-ups recorded in 1994.1
That context matters because given the size of the Republican majority, 2026 still looks broadly comparable to years in which the president’s party held a similarly small advantage. Compare 2026, with Republicans holding a two-seat margin and facing 18 swing seats, with 2022, when Democrats held a four-seat majority and faced 27 swing seats.2
Source: The Cook Political Report
Where redistricting has had a bigger effect is on seats that once looked safe for one party but now appear likely to land in the opposing party’s safe column. The contrast between 2022 and 2026 is especially striking. In 2022, 12 Democratic seats (from the president’s party) were trending toward Republicans, while only one Republican seat was trending toward Democrats3. In 2026, after Republicans gained the upper hand in redistricting, 10 Democratic-held seats appear more likely to move toward Republicans, versus four Republican-held seats moving toward Democrats. Generally, seats move away from the president’s party in a midterm, not toward it, which makes 2026 unusual.
A look at several of the seats moving in either party’s direction in 2026 is illustrative of the role of redistricting. The following chart shows how radical some of the shifts are across a sampling of redistricted seats.
Redistricting will not decide 2026 midterms by itself. The economy, inflation, and political “vibes” still matter. Yet those hoping for a clear answer on who will prevail will be disappointed, as none of these factors are predictive on their own. A quick look at the past 20 years offers more of a complicated collage than a crystal ball.
Take the economy. Comparing 2018 and 2022, Presidents Trump and Biden posted similar real GDP growth heading into their respective midterms, but the Consumer Price Index (CPI) averaged over three times higher in Q3 2022 than in Q3 2018. Even so, while both parties lost their majorities, Democrats outperformed expectations in 2022, and Republicans underperformed. Likewise, in 2014, President Obama’s second midterm as president, the party lost significant ground despite very strong third-quarter GDP growth of 5% heading into the election and CPI averaging below 2%.4 The economy clearly matters, but perceptions of it are harder to pin down than any single data point.
What about the elusive “vibe” factor? Even the qualitative tools designed to capture public sentiment do not give a straightforward answer.
Compare 2010, 2018, and 2022, each the first midterm of a president’s first term. All three presidents had approval ratings in the low 40s just ahead of the midterms, but their trajectories were very different. In 2010, Obama’s approval was down 20 points from his first 100 days, and Democrats lost 25% of their House seats.5 In 2018, Trump’s approval had actually improved by 3 points, yet Republicans still lost 17% of their House seats. In 2022, Biden’s approval was down 17 points, close to Obama’s 2010 decline, but Democrats lost only 4% of their House seats. A notable difference among those elections was the size of the majority going into it: Obama and Trump had large House majorities while Biden did not.
Generic ballot polling comes closer to telling us what to expect. In the lead-up to those same elections, Democrats trailed by 9 points in 2010, Republicans trailed by 7 in 2018, and Democrats trailed by just 3 in 2022. That lines up much more closely with the size of the actual midterm swings. In 2026, Republicans are down 7 points, a point that may be encouraging to Democrats even as they have lost the redistricting race.6
What matters for markets is not simply whether the 2026 map has shifted in one party’s favor but that we should expect safer seats on both sides of the aisle going forward. As districts become less competitive, and as state delegations grow more politically homogeneous, the incentive to compromise weakens and the incentive to govern for the base grows.
This raises the odds of sharper policy swings, more brinkmanship, and less durable legislation when political tides inevitably turn. For businesses and households alike, the result may be a policymaking environment that is harder to predict and therefore more difficult to plan around.
There is, however, a nonzero chance that redistricting backfires. By spreading supporters across more districts to capture additional seats, either party could leave itself more exposed in a wave election and end up with the opposite of its intended result. For 2026, and especially for 2028, we will have to wait and see.
In other news:
Big-picture perspectives on geopolitics, policy, and global economic trends.
1 The Cook Political Report, April/May election ratings by midterm election year.
2 The Cook Political Report, April/May election ratings by midterm election year.
3 The Cook Political Report, April/May election ratings by midterm election year.
4 Bureau of Economic Analysis and Bureau of Labor Statistics.
5 The American Presidency Project.
6 The American Presidency Project (presidential approval change between inauguration and election), Ballotpedia (% of seats lost), and RealClearPolitics (generic ballot).
As of May 27, 2026. The views and opinions contained herein reflect the subjective judgments and assumptions of the authors only and do not necessarily reflect the views of Natixis Investment Managers or any of its affiliates.
This material is provided for informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice. There can be no assurance that developments will transpire as forecasted. Actual results may vary. The views and opinions expressed may change based on market and other conditions. Natixis Investment Managers does not provide tax or legal advice. Please consult with a tax or legal professional prior to making any investment decisions.
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