Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy defended states' rights to redraw congressional districts during a heated exchange with CNN's Dana Bash over gerrymandering and mid-decade redistricting. McCarthy criticized Governor Gavin Newsom's effort to hold a special election to add Democratic seats and compared California and Texas approaches, citing state constitutions. Bash referenced President Trump's call for Texas to redraw maps mid-decade and suggested a partisan double standard. McCarthy cited past Republican competition in California, his own electoral gains, and insisted that voters should decide and each state must follow its constitution.
But it's because mid-decade, it's because that's what President Trump is asking them to do. As McCarthy protested, Bash played a clip of Trump saying he wanted just a very simple redrawing of Texas. We pick up five seats. Bash claimed, If that was a Democratic president asking, starting this whole thing mid-decade, asking a Democratic-controlled legislature to redraw the maps and pick up five seats, you would understandably be hitting the roof.
California Republicans vote 39%. They have 17% of the vote. They'll now be down to 6%. Democrats have 83%. You're very upset about Texas. You know what Republicans will have in Texas after they have 56% of the vote? About 72%. Do you know what the Democrats have in Illinois? They have more than 83% of the linesYou haven't done one show on that. That's not true! Bash protested. We do it all the time! I just showed the map. We do a lot.
Each state has their right, McCarthy continued. And you know what? The Republicans in Illinois didn't run away from the state. You know what? In California, when they did that, we didn't run away. We competed. Nancy Pelosi was the speaker, and I won the majority by five seats. And you know what? I won those five seats in California, which people believed would be very difficult to do. So, I believe the voters should have the say.
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