Missouri governor signs congressional map redrawn to boost Republicans

The governor of Missouri signed into law on Sunday a new congressional map that Republicans hope will help them win an additional House seat in next year’s midterm elections.

The Republicans’ push, which came outside the usual once-a-decade cycle for redrawing congressional maps and at the urging of President Donald Trump, splices the Democratic-leaning core of Kansas City into districts with large, heavily Republican rural areas. The new map threatens the reelection chances of Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a Democrat who has spent 20 years in Congress and was the first Black mayor of Kansas City.

Republicans hold supermajorities in both chambers of the Missouri General Assembly, and Gov. Mike Kehoe, a Republican, had been expected to sign the measure.

If the new map takes effect, it is expected to make it easier for Republicans to win seven of Missouri’s eight seats in the U.S. House. Under the current map, Republicans hold six seats and Democrats hold two.

With midterm elections looming and Trump’s party holding a small majority in Congress, the president and his allies have leaned on Republican-led states to redraw maps to help conservative congressional candidates next year.

Texas was first, enacting new borders that Republicans hope will flip five Democratic-leaning seats. California Democrats have attempted to counter that by asking voters to approve a new map that would flip five Republican-held districts.

Republicans see opportunities in other conservative states, including Kansas, Indiana and Ohio. Democrats may also try to redraw maps in states they lead to pick up seats.

Opponents of the new Missouri map hope to prevent it from taking effect. At least two lawsuits have been filed in state courts arguing that redistricting in the middle of the decade violates the Missouri Constitution. One of the lawsuits argues that a small part of Kansas City is included in two districts under the new map, a claim that the governor disputes. More litigation could follow.

Opponents of the new law want to put the map to a statewide vote by using a quirk of Missouri law known as a veto referendum. If opponents gather enough signatures by early December, the new map would be paused until voters could decide whether it should take effect. To place the issue on the ballot, opponents must gather more than 100,000 signatures across six congressional districts.

Under the old map, Independence Boulevard Christian Church in Kansas City was squarely within Cleaver’s congressional district. But if the new lines take effect, the church building would be in one district, one of its parking lots would be in a second and the Latin American grocery store across the street would be in a third.

The church has been a mainstay in northeastern Kansas City for more than a century, staying on its busy street corner even as the neighborhood around it transitioned from wealthy to more economically diverse. These days, its pastor said, hundreds of people struggling with the cost of living come to the church building each week for a free meal or to receive basic medical care. Many people in the neighborhood are immigrants or refugees.

“If you attach one of these corners to the people 250 miles away, which is what they’re doing, then suddenly you dilute the needs of the people in the urban core,” said the pastor, the Rev. Mindy Fugarino, who was among thousands of people who protested the new map at the Missouri Capitol.

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