From the New York Times, I'm Rachel Abrams, and this is The Daily.

Texas is about to gerrymander five new house seats. In California, they're ready to retaliate.

Governor Gavin Newsom says that California must also redraw its congressional maps to create five new districts, effectively fighting fire with fire.

Today, I talk to my colleague Laurel Rosenhall about whether California voters will actually go for this plan, whether it'll even work if they do, and what is at stake either way.

It's Friday, August 22nd.

Laurel Rosenhall, so nice to have you on the Daily.

Thanks, Rachel. I'm thrilled to be here.

So we're talking to you today because this week, California lawmakers have been rushing through these bills that would make it possible for California to redraw its maps in favor of Democrats,

basically directly counter what we just saw in Texas. And as we've been watching this unfold in California, it feels like what we are

seeing is actually kind of unusual. And you, Laurel, you have been covering California and its

politics for over two decades. So I'm wondering if it feels unusual to you.

Absolutely.

This is a really wild storyline here in California.

It's not unusual for California lawmakers to respond when they see red states taking actions that Democrats in California disagree with, such as on abortion or transgender

rights or other policies like this. But to see this kind of just raw, hardball politics, just really

cutthroat power play between these states is just pretty wild to witness and to cover.

It sounds like what you're saying is that what we're seeing here is California taking that

dynamic to kind of a whole new level. Yeah, this is basically, you know, one side's playing

dirty. The other side's going to jump in and play dirty too. Well, let's talk about specifics.

What exactly is California doing?

So California is passing a mid-decade redistricting, you know, a gerrymander, and the idea is to

just do a direct counterpunch to what the Texas Republicans are doing. The difference, though,

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