Democratic lawmakers who fled their state to stymie Republican plans to redraw political maps at the behest of President Donald Trump announced on Monday they were "returning to Texas on our terms," as the battle lines harden 15 months before the U.S. holds midterm elections.

In the decentralized electoral system of the U.S., states primarily determine federal congressional districts, though the courts can sometimes act as a check on abuses. 

The outcome of the escalating national war over redistricting could determine control of the House of Representatives, where Republicans hold a narrow 219-212 majority. After Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott last month announced the plan for redistricting legislation, Democratic members of the Texas House left the state in early August to deny Abbott's party the quorum needed to vote on legislation.  

With no Republicans on their side, Texas Democrats can't stop the process legislatively. The redrawn map could give Republicans an additional five seats in the House in Washington, D.C.

Nevertheless, the more than 50 Texas Democrats who fled the state — most to Illinois — said in a post to their account on X that "the fight continues." 

"After rallying Americans to join this existential battle for democracy, we're returning to Texas on our terms — ready to build the legal record needed to defeat these unconstitutional maps in court," the group said. 

Dozens of Texas Democratic lawmakers have fled the state. For The National, CBC’s Peter Armstrong explains why they left and what could happen next.

Several states consider redistricting

Trump wants to help maintain Republicans' slim control of Congress in next year's midterms as a raft of polls indicate the White House's policies so far are generally unpopular with the electorate. Reports have emerged that other Republican-led states may also consider a redistricting process.

Several polls suggest the redistricting push itself is unpopular. As well, pro-democracy activists and labour groups held demonstrations in 44 states and Washington, D.C., on Saturday,  the coalition Texas For All told Reuters, to protest the plans of the Trump administration and Texas Republicans to redraw the congressional map. 

While redistricting must occur every 10 years to incorporate U.S. Census data, redrawing maps in the middle of the decade has historically been rare.

Some Democratic governors are vowing to fight back. California Gov Gavin Newsom on Thursday unveiled a redistricting plan in his state that he says would give Democrats there five more Congressional seats, and Gov. Kathy Hochul has plotted a similar response in New York, saying Democrats need to "fight fire with fire."

The practice of gerrymandering — drawing district lines to benefit one party over another — has contributed to a decline in the number of competitive House seats. Only about three dozen districts out of 435 are seen as competitive by nonpartisan analysts as of August.

Order 'unconstitutional on its face': Democratic group

Meanwhile, Trump said on Monday he would sign an executive order ahead of next year's midterm elections, saying he would lead "a movement" targeting mail-in balloting and voting machines across the country.  

Trump, a Republican, previously signed a March 25 executive order targeting elections that has been blocked by the courts. States run elections separately in each of the 50 U.S. states, though Trump in his Truth Social post characterized states as "merely an agent for the Federal Government in counting and tabulating the votes."

Democracy Docket, which is aligned with the Democratic Party, said in a statement any executive order in line with Trump's post would be "unconstitutional on its face."

"The idea that states are just agents of the federal government in any sphere, let alone voting, runs completely contrary to the federalist system the Founding Fathers established in general, and specifically runs afoul of the 10th Amendment," the group said. 

Trump — who on other issues including abortion has promoted the idea of "state's rights" — also falsely stated that the U.S. was "now the only Country in the World that uses Mail-In Voting" because other countries "gave it up because of the MASSIVE VOTER FRAUD ENCOUNTERED."

The president has offered a number of inaccurate and misleading statements about voting by mail, a process he has taken advantage of himself. Republican voters also used to enthusiastically vote by mail before the 2020 election, and there are reports Trump was advised by Republican officials to temper his mail fraud comments in last year's election so as to improve his chances of winning. 

Trump began making unfounded allegations of mail fraud months before the 2020 election, when it became apparent that the COVID-19 pandemic would affect voting behaviour. 

Allegations of voter fraud after his 2020 loss to Joe Biden were described later by his attorney general William Barr at the time as like a game of "Whac-a-Mole." Barr said there was no evidence of widespread fraud.

Dozens of lawsuits filed on behalf of Trump were rejected by the courts, and no plausible explanation emerged as to how the vote total for the presidential race alone was corrupted while congressional, gubernatorial and myriad other races on 2020 ballots were unaffected or contested without incident.

However, Trump supporters who agreed the election was stolen from him descended on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to prevent the certification of Biden's victory.

To begin his second term, Trump has pardoned those convicted of violent acts and other offences related to their participation at the Capitol. The Justice Department also announced an unspecified "investigation" targeting the cybersecurity official in Trump's 2020 administration who said that year's vote was "the most secure in American history."

Trump's social media post on Monday also made mention of "controversial voting machines," though those machines are able to produce paper ballots, and nearly all states audit the machine counts, including in many cases a hand-count of paper records.

Toronto-founded Dominion Voting Systems received $787.5 million US from Fox News in 2023 to settle a defamation lawsuit, after the network amplified many of the outlandish claims about the voting technology company made by Trump and his surrogates in the weeks following the 2020 vote. 

On Monday, it was announced that Dominion and MAGA network Newsmax have settled similar claims for a total of $67 million. Newsmax previously settled a libel suit from voting technology company Smartmatic for $40 million.