Trump targets red state Republican lawmakers in push for congressional redistricting

"I will be strongly endorsing against any State Senator or House member from the Great State of Indiana that votes against the Republican Party, and our Nation, by not allowing for Redistricting for Congressional seats in the United States House of Representatives," Trump wrote in a social media post.

Indiana is the latest battlefield in the high-stakes redistricting showdown pitting Trump and Republicans versus Democrats to shape the 2026 midterm landscape in the fight for the House majority.

Despite pressure from Trump and his political team, Indiana Republican Senate leader Rodric Bray announced last week that there wasn't enough support in the chamber to move forward with redistricting.

Trump on Sunday lambasted Bray and another Republican state senator, calling for their ouster.

"Because of these two politically correct type 'gentlemen,' and a few others, they could be depriving Republicans of a Majority in the House, A VERY BIG DEAL!" the president charged.

And Fox News has confirmed that Trump has invited some of the Indiana Republicans who are holding out against redistricting to White House meetings in the coming days. The news was first reported by Politico.

Trump, in his Sunday post, also took a jab at Republican Gov. Mike Braun of Indiana, arguing that the governor "perhaps, is not working the way he should to get the necessary Votes."

Braun on Monday wrote on social media that "I just had a great call with President Trump! I told him I remain committed to standing with him on the critical issue of passing fair maps in Indiana to ensure the MAGA agenda is successful in Congress."

And the governor claimed that "the Indiana State Senate is hiding behind closed doors and refusing to even bring redistricting to a vote. Hoosiers deserve to know where their legislators stand and expect them to show up for work, not walk out and hide in the dark."

The push by the president in Indiana is part of a broad effort by Trump's political team and the GOP to pad the party's razor-thin House majority to keep control of the chamber in next year's midterms, when the party in power traditionally faces political headwinds and loses seats.

Trump is aiming to prevent what happened during his first term in the White House when Democrats reclaimed the House majority in the 2018 midterm elections.

Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio have drawn new maps as part of the president's push. And Florida and Kansas are also mulling redrawing their maps.

"We must keep the Majority at all costs," Trump wrote Monday.

But Democrats are fighting back.

California voters two weeks ago overwhelmingly passed Proposition 50, a ballot initiative which will temporarily sidetrack the left-leaning state's nonpartisan redistricting commission and return the power to draw the congressional maps to the Democrat-dominated legislature.

That is expected to result in five more Democratic-leaning congressional districts in California, which would counter the passage earlier this year in Texas of a new map that aims to create up to five right-leaning House seats.

Illinois and Maryland, two blue states, and Virginia, where Democrats control the legislature, are also taking steps or seriously considering redistricting.