A longtime Democratic House lawmaker from Texas said Thursday he won’t run for another term if a Republican redistricting plan pushed by President Trump stands as law in the state.
The announcement from 78-year-old Rep. Lloyd Doggett, who has served in Congress since 1995, means Texas Democrats appear to have avoided a potentially messy congressional primary between Doggett and 36-year-old Rep. Greg Casar.
The new congressional lines that Republicans are attempting to pass in Texas created a situation where Doggett, who represents Texas’ 37th congressional district, and Casar, who represents the 35th congressional district, would likely have had to run against each other on the Democratic side in the 37th district due to new boundaries reshaping Casar’s current seat into one favorable to Republicans.
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Both Casar and Doggett currently represent parts of Austin, Texas. Casar’s current seat would be massively redrawn in the proposed changes.
Doggett said in a campaign statement Thursday that “if the courts give Trump a victory in his scheme to maintain control of a compliant House, I will not seek reelection in the reconfigured CD37, even though it contains over 2/3rd of my current constituents.”
Casar, who is in his second term, is chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Doggett was the first Democrat in Congress to call on then-President Joe Biden to leave the 2024 presidential race after his disastrous presidential debate.
Before Doggett’s announcement Thursday, he had publicly attempted to encourage Casar to run in the redrawn 35th district rather than challenge him in a primary for the 37th district.
“My only war is against Trump!” Doggett wrote on social media earlier this month. “2seats better than 1. Abandoning winnable majority Hispanic #TX35 to challenge me in #TX37 helps Trump, divides progressives.”
Doggett pointed to the political tensions in his statement Thursday, saying, “I had hoped that my commitment to reelection under any circumstances would encourage Congressman Casar to not surrender his winnable district to Trump. While his apparent decision is most unfortunate, I prefer to devote the coming months to fighting Trump tyranny and serving Austin rather than waging a struggle with fellow Democrats. If Trump extreme gerrymandering prevails, I wish Congressman Casar the best.”
“Lloyd Doggett is an Austin institution,” Casar said in a social media post following Doggett’s announcement. “I’ve learned so much from him. I’m grateful to him. The fight for democracy continues.”
The controversy surrounding the GOP-led Texas redistricting effort has dragged on for weeks after some Democratic Texas state legislators fled the state during a special session in order to prevent Republicans from having a quorum that would allow them to vote on overhauling the state’s congressional maps.
Eventually they returned, assured that California Democrats are working to counter the congressional gains Texas Republicans are looking to make. On Wednesday, the Texas House passed the bill that will shift the state’s congressional maps to potentially give Republicans five more U.S. House seats.
The bill is expected to soon easily pass the Senate and then be signed into law by the Republican governor of Texas. A challenge in court to the new map appears likely.
