{"id":8522,"date":"2026-08-04T22:37:31","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T22:37:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/relocationtimess.com\/?p=8522"},"modified":"2026-08-04T22:37:31","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T22:37:31","slug":"missouri-election-chief-rejects-bid-to-hold-public-vote-on-trump-backed-congressional-districts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/relocationtimess.com\/?p=8522","title":{"rendered":"Missouri election chief rejects bid to hold public vote on Trump-backed congressional districts"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\n<\/span>AP<\/span>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0<\/span>\n<\/cite><\/div>\n

\n Missouri\u2019s top election official has rejected a citizens\u2019 petition seeking a statewide referendum on new congressional districts backed by President Donald Trump.\n <\/p>

Read more Trump admin revokes visa of Brazilian ambassador to US<\/a><\/p>\n

\n Supporters of the referendum had submitted hundreds of thousands of petition signatures in a bid to force a November election on a new US House map approved by the Republican-led state Legislature. But Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins asserted Tuesday that the petition is void because congressional redistricting plans cannot be subject to voter referendums.\n <\/p>\n

\n The number of petition signatures submitted doesn\u2019t matter, Hoskins said, because \u201cchallenging a congressional map is unconstitutional under Missouri law.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

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\nPhoto Illustration by Alberto Mier\/CNN\/@SenatorBerger via X\/California and Missouri state legislatures<\/span>\n<\/div>\n
Photo Illustration by Alberto Mier\/CNN<\/figcaption>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\nTracking states\u2019 unprecedented redistricting efforts<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

3 min read<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

\n A group backing the referendum effort said it will contest Hoskins\u2019 decision in court.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cSecretary of State Hoskins is making a last desperate attempt to silence the people\u2019s voice in Missouri,\u201d Richard von Glahn, executive director of People Not Politicians Missouri, said in a statement, while asserting there are more than enough signatures to qualify the referendum for the ballot.\n <\/p>\n

\n Missouri was the second Republican-led state, after Texas, to respond to Trump\u2019s call last year to redraw congressional districts to the GOP\u2019s advantage in hopes of holding on to the party\u2019s slim House majority in the midterm elections.\n <\/p>\n

\n The new map, which is being used in Tuesday\u2019s primaries, dramatically reshapes the Kansas City-based 5th Congressional District, held by longtime Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, by stretching it into rural central Missouri to give it a Republican tilt. Republicans already hold six of Missouri\u2019s eight congressional seats and hope to gain another under the new map.\n <\/p>\n

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\n Missouri\u2019s redistricting plan has faced lots of litigation\n<\/h4>\n

\n People Not Politicians, the group sponsoring the referendum drive, submitted more than 300,000 signatures to the secretary of state\u2019s office in December. Local election officials reviewed the signatures\u2019 validity over the ensuing months and approved well more than the roughly 111,000 needed to qualify for the ballot.\n <\/p>\n

\n But Hoskins waited until the last day allowed under state law to announce his decision about the referendum \u2014 a move that let the new districts be used in the meantime.\n <\/p>\n

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\nMissouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins talks to reporters, at his office in the Missouri Capitol in Jefferson City, on Tuesday.<\/span>\n<\/div>\n
David A. Lieb\/AP<\/figcaption>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n Hoskins had long signaled that he was likely to reject the referendum. He asked a federal court last fall to block the referendum petition from being submitted, arguing that congressional redistricting is not subject to a referendum under the US and Missouri constitutions. A judge dismissed the lawsuit as premature, noting in a December ruling that Hoskins had the authority to reject the petition himself if he thought it was unconstitutional.\n <\/p>

Read more Trump laid into Pirro in a tense White House meeting. But their long history might save her job<\/a><\/p>\n

\n When Missouri candidates began filing for office in February, Hoskins said they were doing so under the new districts and told The Associated Press that \u201cthe referendum process was never meant to be used for redistricting.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n If Hoskins is wrong, and a court orders him to place the redistricting referendum on the ballot, it\u2019s unclear what that means for the 2026 elections. Would candidates who win Tuesday\u2019s primaries be allowed to continue running under the new districts in November while voters simultaneously decide whether those districts can be used in future elections? Would candidates run in different districts for the general election than were used in the primaries? Or would courts order a do-over for the congressional primaries using the state\u2019s prior congressional districts?\n <\/p>\n

\n Missouri\u2019s mid-decade redistricting effort already has been among the most litigated nationally, triggering about a dozen lawsuits over the past year.\n <\/p>\n

\n Republicans are ahead in the national redistricting fight\n<\/h4>\n

\n Legislative voting districts typically are redrawn at the start of each decade, immediately after a census. But Trump\u2019s call for Republicans to redraw districts to their advantage led to an unusual outbreak of mid-decade mapmaking. The redistricting effort gained additional steam when the US Supreme Court struck down a majority Black congressional district in Louisiana in late April, prompting Republicans in several Southern states to also redraw districts that had large minority populations.\n <\/p>\n

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\nThe US Capitol on May 21.<\/span>\n<\/div>\n
Aaron Schwartz\/Bloomberg\/Getty Images<\/figcaption>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\nRepublicans are poised to finish this year\u2019s redistricting war 10 seats ahead of Democrats<\/span>\n<\/p>\n

8 min read<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n

\n All told, Republicans think they could win as many as 16 additional seats from new House maps enacted in eight states \u2014 Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Florida, Tennessee, Louisiana and Alabama. Democrats, whose counterattack faced several setbacks, think they could win up to six additional seats from new districts in California and Utah.\n <\/p>\n

\n Voters ultimately will determine whether the new districts perform as intended. Even with redistricting, Republicans are facing headwinds. The president\u2019s party historically has lost congressional seats in the midterms, and Trump\u2019s poor approval ratings could provide an extra hurdle for Republican candidates.\n <\/p>\n

\n Nearly 145 million people \u2014 about two of every five US residents \u2014 live in states with new congressional districts for this election. Additional states are considering redistricting before the 2028 elections.\n <\/p>

Read more Chipotle pulls jalape\u00f1os from some restaurants as health officials investigate salmonella outbreak<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Missouri\u2019s top election official has rejected a citizens\u2019 petition seeking a statewide referendum on new congressional districts backed by President Donald Trump.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":8519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"\nMissouri election chief rejects bid to hold public vote on Trump-backed congressional districts - Relocation Times<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/relocationtimess.com\/?p=8522\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Missouri election chief rejects bid to hold public vote on Trump-backed congressional districts - 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