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Utah redistricting: what to know about the order to redraw congressional maps

Utah is being thrust into a national battle over redistricting.

A court ordered the state this week to redraw its congressional map for the 2026 midterm elections, and the new district boundaries could make one of Utah’s four congressional seats competitive for Democrats as the party fights to topple the Republican party’s slim majority in the House.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump is pushing Republican-led states to add winnable US House seats for the Republican party.

Here’s what to know:

The current map

Utah’s current congressional map was adopted by the state’s Republican-controlled legislature in 2021 and divides heavily populated Salt Lake county – an island of Democratic support in an otherwise red state – among all four congressional districts.

The four congressional districts converge within a couple blocks in the Salt Lake City suburb of Millcreek. A voter could grab a milkshake at the beloved Iceberg Drive Inn and cross into all four districts before it melts.

Lawmakers presented the map as a way for each representative to serve both urban and rural areas. One district spans the entire eastern border of the state and groups vastly different communities, from the winter resort town of Park City, to the urban center of Provo, down to the red rock recreation hub of Moab.

Voting rights groups that challenged the map argued it intentionally dilutes the Democratic vote and produces Congress members who aren’t suited to represent all of their constituents.

Before the map was adopted in 2021, one district had traded hands between Democrats and Republicans. All have since elected Republicans by wide margins.

The court’s ruling

District court judge Dianna Gibson on Monday declared the map unlawful because the legislature had circumvented an independent redistricting commission established by voters to ensure districts don’t deliberately favor a party, a practice known as gerrymandering.

Voters in 2018 narrowly approved a ballot initiative that created the commission to draw boundaries for Utah’s legislative and congressional districts, which the legislature was required to consider. Lawmakers repealed the initiative in 2020 and replaced it with a law that transformed the commission into an advisory board that they could choose to ignore. The following year, lawmakers disregarded a congressional map proposal from the commission and drew one of their own.

The Utah supreme court said the legislature is extremely limited in changing laws passed by voters and sent the case back to Gibson to decide the map’s fate.

“How district lines are drawn can either safeguard representation and ensure accountability by elected representatives or erode public trust, silence voices and weaken the rule of law,” she wrote in the ruling.

What’s next

Gibson has given lawmakers until 24 September to adopt a map that complies with voter-approved standards. Voting rights advocates who were involved in the legal challenge can submit alternate proposals.

The tight deadline for lawmakers to draw new maps could push them to reconsider proposals from the independent redistricting commission that they had ignored after the 2020 census. Those plans create a compact district combining the Democrat-heavy cities of Salt Lake City and Park City, while grouping other cities geographically.

Republican leaders could cut their losses by creating a single left-leaning block, or gamble on creating competitive districts that Republicans will fight to keep.

Republican officials could also use appeals to try to run out the clock before a candidate filing deadline in early January to possibly delay adopting new maps until 2028.

The US supreme court is unlikely to intervene, and the state supreme court may be hesitant to entertain an appeal after it already asked Gibson to decide.

What voters are likely to say

Registered Republicans overwhelmingly outnumber registered Democrats in the state. However, voter-registration data doesn’t paint the full picture.

Only about 12.3% of Utah voters are registered Democrats, but more than triple that number voted for Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election. About 29% are unaffiliated, and many voters in the state who hold liberal beliefs choose to register as Republicans to vote in the primaries and have a say in intra-party matters.

That uncertainty may create complications for Republicans as they navigate rapidly redrawing boundaries that shield their seats while complying with stricter standards.

How this fits into the national picture?

The ruling throws Republicans a curveball in a state where they expected a clean sweep while they’re working to add winnable seats elsewhere. Trump has urged governors to take up mid-decade redistricting before the midterms, when the sitting president’s party tends to lose seats.

In Texas, a plan awaiting the approval of the governor, Greg Abbott, includes five new districts that would favor Republicans. Ohio Republicans already were scheduled to revise their maps to make them more partisan, and Indiana, Florida and Missouri may choose to make changes. Some Democrat-led states say they may enter the redistricting arms race, but so far only California has taken action to offset Republican gains in Texas.

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