Maryland lawmaker Senator Clarence Lam (D) introduced legislation to begin the redistricting process in the state.
In a statement on X, Lam said he “filed a bill request to introduce legislation in the Senate of Maryland to redraw our congressional districts.”
“I submitted this because we need to fight back by sending a message to other states like Missouri and Indiana: ‘Don’t do it. But if you do pass these extreme gerrymanders, Maryland stands ready to act,'” he wrote. “I don’t love having to do this, but it’s necessary. I’m tired of bringing a pencil to a knife fight. All too often, Democrats are reluctant to utilize all their tools to defend their constituents and protect their communities.”
Rep. Andy Harris (R-MD), the only Republican representing the state in Congress, condemned redistricting discussions. “It disenfranchises huge amounts of the Maryland population. It just wouldn’t be fair,” he said in an interview with WTOP this week.
“For the governor, it would be a stunning reversal from his position. If you want to go and listen to his inaugural address, he talked about, ‘If they’re good ideas, you work across the aisle,'” Harris said, adding, “The most partisan thing you could do is gerrymander a state that has had two Republican governors out of the last four, into a state that can’t send a Republican to Congress.”
Maryland Governor Wes Moore (D) told CBS News’s “Face the Nation” that “all options are on the table” for redistricting.
“The fact that the president of the United States, very similar to what he did in Georgia, where he called up a series of voter registrants and said, ‘I need you to find me more votes’ — we’re watching the same thing now, where he’s calling up legislatures around the country and saying, ‘I need you to find me more congressional districts,’” he argued.
A California Republican similarly introduced a bill to split the state of California in response to redistricting efforts that would “silence rural voices and rig the political system against them forever.”
