Missouri voters block GOP-drawn congressional map in referendum
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The gist
Missouri voters approved a referendum blocking the GOP-drawn congressional map from taking effect.
The vote ends a year-long fight over redistricting ahead of the 2026 midterms.
Background
Missouri is one of nine states that enacted new congressional maps ahead of the 2026 midterms outside the usual once-a-decade process, after President Donald Trump called for mid-decade redistricting. The 2025 map was drawn to give Republicans an extra U.S. House seat and pulled longtime Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver into a heavily Republican district. Opponents gathered more than 300,000 signatures to force a public vote, but Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins refused to certify the referendum, calling it unconstitutional, and the dispute went through federal courts up to the Supreme Court.
How it unfolded
- 2025Missouri adopted a new congressional map intended to give Republicans an additional U.S. House seat; the lines drew longtime Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver into a heavily Republican district.
- Dec 9, 2025Opponents including the group People Not Politicians submitted more than 300,000 signatures to put the new map to a vote in the November 2026 general election.
- Aug 2026Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins waited until the statutory deadline to announce he would not certify the referendum for the November ballot, saying it was unconstitutional.
- Sep 4, 2026Republican congressional nominees Robert Onder and Richard Brattin and two voters sued in federal court in St. Louis seeking to revive the 2025 map.
- Sep 25, 2026For the third time in less than a month, the Supreme Court declined to let Missouri use the new map in the November 2026 elections, pausing a federal appeals court ruling that had directed the state to implement it.
- Nov 4, 2026NBC News projected the referendum succeeded, blocking the GOP-drawn map from going into effect for future elections.
Key terms
- redistricting
- The process of drawing electoral district boundaries, done after each ten-year census in the United States.
- midterms
- US general elections held near the midpoint of a president's four-year term, when all House seats and about a third of Senate seats are contested.
- referendum
- A direct vote by the electorate on a proposal, law, or political issue, either binding or advisory.
Source: Wikipedia
Who’s saying what
- Official
- Secretary of State Denny Hoskins said the referendum was unconstitutional when he declined to certify it for the November ballot.
- Support
- Referendum backers including People Not Politicians gathered more than 300,000 signatures to force a public vote on the map.