Ferguson open to redistricting talks as special session looms

Maryland voters could still see the state’s 7-1 congressional split tested before the 2026 election, but Bill Ferguson said any move toward an 8-0 Democratic map would first require a constitutional amendment and months of legal risk. The practical stakes are clearest in District 1, where Rep. Andy Harris remains Maryland’s lone Republican in Congress.

Ferguson said Maryland Senate Democrats will convene to discuss a special session on redistricting, a notable shift after months of resistance from the Senate president. The House of Delegates approved a new map in February that could potentially give Democrats all eight U.S. House seats, but Ferguson did not advance it in the Senate before the 2026 General Assembly session ended April 13.

The Senate president said Maryland could not simply draw a new congressional map and send it to court. He said the state would need a constitutional amendment first, pointing to the 2021 court ruling that invalidated Maryland’s earlier 8-0 Democratic map. The Maryland Court of Appeals said that plan violated Article III, Section 4 of the state constitution and amounted to extreme partisan gerrymandering.

That legal warning has been at the center of Ferguson’s hesitation. In February, he said the window of opportunity had closed on midcycle redistricting and warned that a trial-level court fight would take at least three to four months, with an appeal likely to follow. That timeline has made any new map before the November 2026 election look increasingly difficult, even as pressure grows from Democrats who want Maryland to respond to GOP-led states.

The fight intensified after President Donald Trump called on Texas to redraw its map to try to gain five Republican seats, and after a late-April 2026 U.S. Supreme Court decision weakened the federal Voting Rights Act. Gov. Wes Moore and House Democrats have argued that Maryland should not stand on the sidelines while Republicans push for gains elsewhere. House Speaker Joseline Peña-Melnyk said the chamber pushed redistricting because it felt it needed to “meet the moment.” Rep. Jamie Raskin said Republicans are trying to build all-Republican delegations in the South and that Democrats should fight back.

The redistricting clash also overlapped with another failed Annapolis fight, as a separate effort by Sen. Cheryl Kagan and Del. Linda Foley to change how legislative vacancies are filled through special elections again stalled. For Baltimore City, the immediate question is not abstract mapmaking in Annapolis. It is whether Maryland’s only Republican seat, and the balance of influence in the state’s congressional delegation, could still change before voters go to the polls next year.