Supreme Court reinstates previous Missouri congressional map weeks before midterm elections

Jack BirleSeptember 10, 2026

The article reports that the U.S. Supreme Court swiftly reinstated Missouri’s previous congressional map after a legal challenge. This action halted a recent court order that had restored a 2025 map favoring Republicans with a 7-1 advantage, which had been used for the August primaries. Instead, Missouri must revert to a 2022 map giving Republicans a 6-2 lead. The 2025 map was challenged by a left-wing group that collected enough signatures to put it up for a referendum in November, leading to its temporary halt. This legal back-and-forth marks the third change to Missouri’s congressional map in a week and likely impacts the political balance in the state’s House delegation.

The Supreme Court granted an emergency petition on Thursday to reinstate Missouri’s previous congressional map, marking the third time the map has changed in the past week and likely costing Republicans a seat in the House of Representatives.

The high court issued a brief, unsigned ruling halting a federal district court’s Tuesday order, which had restored a congressional map drawn in 2025 that would have likely given Republicans a 7-1 advantage over Democrats in the Show-Me State’s congressional delegation. Now, the state must revert to a map passed in 2022 that gave the GOP a 6-2 advantage. The 2025 map was used for Missouri’s primary elections in August, but the 2022 map was reinstated by the Missouri Supreme Court last week when the state’s high court ruled that a left-wing group had gathered enough signatures to put the 2025 map up for a referendum in November and halted use of the new map in the meantime.