Tennessee Republicans passed a new congressional map this week that dismantles Rep. Steve Cohen's Memphis-anchored district — the state's only majority-Black congressional seat and its only Democratic House seat — according to reporting by The Hill. The move follows direct pressure from President Trump to redraw the map to Republican advantage ahead of November 2026.
Said Cohen: "Next stop is the courts."
This is the oldest play in the post-Reconstruction toolkit: crack a geographically concentrated minority community across multiple districts to dilute its voting strength. The Supreme Court has blocked this maneuver before — see Allen v. Milligan (2023) — but each cycle the maps get drawn anyway, the litigation drags past the election, and voters live with the unconstitutional lines while the case works its way up. Tennessee Republicans appear willing to bet the courts are slower than November.