By Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES () - California Governor Gavin Newsom held a campaign-style event on Thursday to promote a redistricting plan aimed at preventing what he described as President Donald Trump's attempt to manipulate the upcoming congressional election and secure a Republican majority in the House by altering Texas's political boundaries.
Newsom stated that his plan, which is set for a special vote on November 4, would establish five additional Democratic U.S. congressional districts in California, balancing any seats that Republicans might acquire due to Trump's influence in redrawing district boundaries in Texas, just under four years after the last revision.
Donald Trump, you've provoked the bear and we'll retaliate," Newsom stated, referencing the grizzly featured on California's state flag. "We're going to counter fire with fire.
The rival proposals in California and Texas are set before the November 2026 midterm elections, during which Democrats aim to regain control of the U.S. House of Representatives.
As Democratic elected officials and labor union leaders met inside the Democracy Center's auditorium in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday, approximately two dozen armed federal border agents, equipped with riot helmets and balaclava masks, were seen loitering near a street corner outside the facility.
The governor highlighted the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in his comments, implying their presence was an effort by Trump to instill fear.
"He's a former president who didn't succeed. Who else would deploy ICE while we're having this discussion? Someone who is weak," Newsom stated. The agents departed the location within 30 minutes of their arrival.
Newsom's event represented a possibly crucial turning point in Texas, where Republicans, who hold the state legislature, were concluding a special session that Republican Governor Greg Abbott had convened to implement a redistricting map designed to shift five Democratic House seats in the upcoming elections.
The House is currently led by Republicans with a slim 219-212 advantage.
To block the plan from being approved, over 50 Democratic lawmakers from Texas have left the capital in Austin and are staying in different states led by Democrats, such as California, thereby preventing Texas Republicans from achieving a legislative majority.
The 30-day special session was scheduled to end on Friday, but Abbott was promising an extension. It remained uncertain if the redistricting actions taken by California Democrats would be sufficient to convince Texas Democrats to stop their walkout.
OBAMA WEIGHS IN
Former President Barack Obama and his former attorney general, Eric Holder, participated in a video conference call with Texas House Democrats on Thursday, praising their work in opposing what they described as a Republican "power grab."
Abbott and other Texas Republican officials have consistently raised the pressure on the state's Democratic legislators to come back, warning them with civil arrest warrants, financial penalties, wage garnishment, and removal from the legislature.
Newsom and other Democratic officials who addressed the rally, alongside leaders from several of California's largest labor unions, presented their campaign as a fight to protect Democracy and the rule of law against a president exhibiting autocratic tendencies, which are not checked by his own party in Congress.
The governor expressed assurance that both chambers of California's state legislature would achieve the two-thirds majority needed to bring the newly created maps to voters, through a special election scheduled for November 4.
(Reported by Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Additional reports from Daniel Cole in Los Angeles and Trevor Hunnicutt in Washington; Edited by Leslie Adler)