Empty seats in the House chamber of the Texas state Capitol in Austin on August 5, 2025. Texas Democratic lawmakers have fled the state in protest of a proposed Republican redistricting plan.

Editor's note: This op-ed originally appeared in the Houston Chronicle.

Up until now, Democrats have treated our political system like it’s still governed by norms, guarded by limits and rooted in fairness. Rules were meant to be followed. It hurts to say it, but that era has come to an end.

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Since Donald Trump’s rise, Republicans have declared war on the American people. They slashed health care, gutted nutrition programs and stacked the Supreme Court to rip away freedoms we once took for granted. And now, they’re trying to rig the rules of democracy itself.

At President Trump’s direction, Texas state House Republicans are attempting to redraw their congressional maps mid-decade, an aggressive power grab designed to flip as many as five current Democratic seats. They’ve carved up diverse communities in Houston, Dallas and along the border to silence the voters who live there.

What Texas is doing isn't a clever........

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