Will Indiana follow Texas' lead in redistricting mid-decade? (Getty Images)
Vice President J.D. Vance recently visited Indiana to meet with Gov. Mike Braun and Republican leaders. They discussed a plan to redraw the state’s congressional districts this year, mid-decade, in order to gain one or both of the seats currently held by Indiana Democrats and rig the 2026 mid-terms so Republicans can preserve their very slim House majority.
We are scholars and teachers of U.S. law and politics. And we are deeply troubled by the Trump administration’s attempt to rewrite the electoral rules mid-stream to maximize its power, and by Indiana Republicans’ failure to immediately reject such a transparently partisan move, which would corrupt the fairness of our elections. Whatever our party affiliation, all Hoosiers should care about fairness. We would never support changing the rules in the middle of a basketball game so that our team would gain unfair advantage. We want winners to win fair and square. In sports, and in politics.
Such corruption is possible because the process whereby Congressional districts are created is localized and susceptible to being rigged by those bent on gaining an unfair partisan advantage.
According to the U.S. Constitution, Congress allocates seats in the House of Representatives to states based on population. A census must be taken within every ten years to determine how population shifts may change the number of Congressional districts allocated to each state — a process called reapportionment. The actual shape of Congressional districts in each state is determined by state legislation.
In 1964, the Supreme Court ruled that Congressional districts must be of roughly equal population and honor the principle of “one person, one vote.” Since then, Congressional redistricting has almost always been done on the ten-year cycle, except when federal courts have required certain states to redraw their maps to bring them into compliance with federal election law.
But now Texas Republicans are trying to redraw their Congressional map mid-decade. The reason why: because President Trump has very publicly called upon them to do this, telling CNBC’s Squawk Box: “We have an opportunity in Texas to pick up five seats. We have a really good governor, and we have good people in Texas. And I won Texas . . . and we are entitled to five more seats.”
It should be obvious that Trump’s vote total in the 2024 presidential election confers no GOP entitlement to extra House seats, which are not allocated based on presidential popularity (indeed, while Trump only received 56% of the 2024 Presidential vote, the Texas GOP controls 66% of the state’s House seats). If the party wants five more seats in Texas or two more in Indiana, then the correct way to obtain them is to run strong candidates in districts currently held by Democrats, and win the elections in those districts, fair and square.
The administration’s push for Texas, Indiana, and other “red” states to redistrict now has one very clear purpose: to change the electoral map, midstream, so that Trump and his party can retain control of the entire federal government by giving more power to voters they like while taking electoral power away from voters they don’t like.
And that is simply not fair.
Hoosier citizens, and not statehouse Republicans, should choose who they want to represent them in their congressional districts in 2026 and 2028 and 2030. And they can freely choose only if the elections are fair. Any party that tries to try to change district boundaries in advance of an election just so they have a better chance of winning the election is doing something that has a simple name: cheating.
Basketball coach John Wooden, a legendary Hoosier, famously taught his players to “never lie, never cheat, never steal.”
Indiana Republicans should heed coach Wooden’s famous words, politely refuse to do the bidding of the Trump administration, and stand tall, with their Democratic counterparts, and all patriotic Hoosiers, in defense of the fairness of our elections.