Moore says “we’re not going to sit on our hands” on redistricting

Maryland Gov. Wes Moore on Sunday defended the creation of a redistricting committee to edge out the single Republican-held seat in his state, saying he’s “not sure why we should be playing by a different set of rules than Texas, or than Florida, or than Ohio or all these other places.” 

“I want this bipartisan commission to be able to actually speak with the people and to be able to go through their process and just simply say that if other states are going to go through this process, that we’re not just going to sit on our hands because Donald Trump tells us to,” Moore said on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan. “That’s not the way this process is going to work.” 

Last week, Moore announced he had formed a commission to explore mid-decade redistricting in the state, following the lead of President Trump’s push to redraw districts in GOP-led states Texas, Missouri and North Carolina to net more seats for Republicans. 

While Democrats initially decried Mr. Trump’s efforts as an attempt to create an unfair advantage for Republicans, California’s Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom pushed a ballot measure to redraw the state’s congressional districts to gain up to five seats for Democrats. The measure, known as Prop 50, passed Tuesday with more than 60% of the vote, and an energized Newsom held a rally in Houston on Saturday, where he said Texas had “woke us up.” 

Eight of Maryland’s nine House seats are already occupied by Democrats, a state former Vice President Kamala Harris won by more than 28 points in 2024. A redistricting effort would target the single Republican-held seat in the eastern part of the state. 

Maryland’s commission is chaired by U.S. Sen. Angela Alsobrooks, a close ally of Moore’s, and is comprised of Senate President Bill Ferguson, Maryland House Speaker Adrienne A. Jones, former Attorney General Brian Frosh and Cumberland Mayor Raymond Morriss. 

Maryland law dictates congressional maps are drawn by the state Assembly, where Democrats have a supermajority. Moore would have to call a special session of the Assembly to move forward with the effort. 

But Ferguson, a Democrat, has opposed the redistricting effort, writing in a letter last month that “mid-cycle redistricting for Maryland presents a reality where the legal risks are too high, the timeline for action is dangerous, the downside risk to Democrats is catastrophic, and the certainty of our existing map would be undermined.”

Ferguson said last week the Democrats’ election victories “shows we don’t need to rig the system to win.”

But Moore insisted Sunday that “fighting for democracy is never risky.” He noted that he and Ferguson agree that there is a “crisis that Donald Trump has put us in.”

“Where we differ is the urgency that this moment requires, the fight that this moment requires,” Moore said. “And I personally am someone who is not going to allow Donald Trump to determine whether or not Maryland follows this idea of saying, are we going to do everything we can to make sure we’re preserving our democracy.”