Maryland Politics

Maryland Democrats are moving a new congressional map through the state House of Delegates that would give their party an edge in every district and likely erase the state’s lone Republican-held U.S. House seat, represented by Freedom Caucus chair Rep. Andy Harris. A House committee in Annapolis is scheduled to vote Tuesday on the plan, drawn by Gov. Wes Moore’s Redistricting Advisory Commission, which Harris derided as 'partisan gerrymandering' and vowed to challenge in court. Even Democratic Senate President Bill Ferguson has criticized the draft, calling it 'objectively unconstitutional,' in part because it stretches Harris’s Eastern Shore district across the five‑mile Chesapeake Bay Bridge into pieces of two other counties. Moore is expected to testify before the panel, and he recently met with House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries in Washington to discuss the map, underscoring that national party leaders see the seat as a target in the broader 2026 battle for House control. The Maryland fight comes amid a nationwide redistricting arms race, following GOP‑driven maps in Texas and North Carolina and Democratic efforts in California and Virginia, as both parties press every legal and procedural edge to squeeze out more favorable districts before the midterms.