Rep. Kevin Kiley, I-Calif., said Wednesday on Newsmax that the mid-decade redistricting fights now spreading from California to Virginia should be called off entirely, and he pitched a bipartisan deal pairing a national ban on gerrymandering with a voter ID requirement.
Speaking on "Wake Up America," Kiley said the growing use of off-cycle map changes is upending the relationship between voters and their representatives with little net partisan benefit to show for it.
His comments came a day after Virginia voters approved a Democrat-backed constitutional amendment clearing the way for a new congressional map that could net the party up to four additional U.S. House seats in November.
Kiley said both Virginia and his home state of California had not only redrawn lines for partisan advantage but had also pushed aside independent commissions that voters had established to keep politicians out of the process.
California voters approved a similar mid-decade measure, Proposition 50, in November 2025, allowing the Democrat-led Legislature to bypass the state's Citizens Redistricting Commission.
"This is kind of a new thing, a new phenomenon," Kiley said. "We're used to gerrymandering every ten years after the census. But to start doing it in the middle of the decade, or what is it going to suddenly become something that happens every two years when one side or the other can sense an advantage?"
The congressman argued the accelerating back-and-forth has produced little partisan payoff once the tallies from both parties are combined.
National trackers have reached a similar conclusion.
Republicans have gained as many as nine new seats through redrawn maps in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio, while Democrats stand to pick up as many as 10 across California, Utah, and now Virginia.
Kiley said the disruption has come at the expense of voters' ties to their members of Congress, with district maps being upended "for really no purpose at all."
He pointed to his own legislation, H.R. 4889, which he introduced in August 2025 to bar mid-decade redistricting nationwide and nullify new maps adopted after the November 2024 election.
The bill has not received a floor vote.
Kiley also floated a broader bargain aimed at breaking the stalemate on election rules. He said lawmakers should pair a prohibition on gerrymandering with a national voter ID requirement, arguing the combination would allow the country to "finally have fair elections in this country once and for all."
Florida Republicans are also preparing for a special legislative session that could produce two to five new GOP-leaning districts, a move that could swing the cumulative count back toward Republicans.
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Jim Thomas ✉
Jim Thomas is a writer based in Indiana. He holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science, a law degree from U.I.C. Law School, and has practiced law for more than 20 years.
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