A Missouri Judge Just Upheld the Map Built to Beat Emanuel Cleaver — For the Second Time This Year.
- 300,000+ signatures a voter group gathered to force a referendum on Missouri's congressional map — rejected as unconstitutional by Secretary of State Denny Hoskins (R-MO) before this ruling upheld him — CNN, Aug. 4, 2026
- 59% of voters in the redrawn 5th District are new to it under the map upheld this week, after it was rebuilt around 14 rural, heavily Republican counties — KCUR
- 2-for-2 Secretary of State Hoskins' own tally of his court wins as of Aug. 19 — "still batting a thousand," he said after the ruling — Missourinet, Aug. 19, 2026
- 5 states — Texas, California, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio — that enacted new mid-decade congressional maps between the 2024 and 2026 elections — Ballotpedia
A Cole County judge cleared the way Wednesday for Missouri Republicans to use their gerrymandered congressional map in the November midterms, rejecting a bid by the voter group People Not Politicians to put the map to a statewide referendum. Judge Daniel Green ruled that Missouri’s constitutional referendum provisions “do not apply to congressional redistricting enacted by the General Assembly” — meaning Secretary of State Denny Hoskins (R-MO) acted lawfully when he refused to certify a petition carrying more than 300,000 signatures.
It is the second time in four months a Missouri court has upheld the “Missouri First Map” against a legal challenge. The map is designed to give Republicans a real shot at unseating Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II (D-MO-5), an 81-year-old, eleven-term Kansas City Democrat, by cracking his district three ways and rebuilding what remains of it around 14 rural, heavily Republican counties.
Plaintiff Richard von Glahn said he would appeal immediately to the Missouri Supreme Court, where the case is expected to be resolved before Missouri’s roughly Sept. 8 ballot-certification deadline. Here is what the ruling actually said, what the map does, and why both parties are treating a single Missouri House seat as a proxy fight for control of Congress.
Green’s order, issued Aug. 19, 2026, sided entirely with Hoskins and the Republican-aligned groups that intervened to defend the map. The court held that the state constitution’s referendum clause — which lets voters petition to suspend and vote down a law the legislature passes — was never written to reach congressional district lines. The practical effect, in the court’s own language, is that the Missouri First Map “remains in full force and effect for the 2026 general election.”
Hoskins had rejected the 300,000-signature petition two weeks earlier as unconstitutional regardless of its size. “Whether they had one signature or 500 million signatures doesn’t really matter because they are unconstitutional,” he said when he blocked it on Aug. 4. He treated Wednesday’s ruling as full vindication: “I’m 2-for-2 today and still batting a thousand,” he said afterward, referring to both his own rejection and the court’s affirmation of it.
Von Glahn, People Not Politicians’ executive director and the case’s lead plaintiff, said he would take the fight to the Missouri Supreme Court next. That court is expected to rule before Missouri’s roughly Sept. 8 deadline for certifying the November ballot — meaning the map’s fate could be settled, one way or another, within about three weeks of this story’s publication.
The map at the center of the case cracks Cleaver’s 5th District three ways along Troost Avenue — historically Kansas City’s Black-white dividing line — reassigning pieces into the neighboring 4th and 6th Districts, both already held by Republicans, and stretching what remains of the 5th east into 14 rural, heavily Republican counties. Fifty-nine percent of voters in the redrawn district are new to it. Missouri’s eight-seat delegation currently splits 6 Republicans to 2 Democrats; the new lines are drawn so seven of the eight districts are winnable by a Republican in a good year, leaving Cleaver’s seat as the only one Democrats can realistically defend. State Sen. Rick Brattin (R-MO) won the Aug. 4, 2026 Republican primary to face Cleaver directly in November.
The map exists because Gov. Mike Kehoe (R-MO) called a special legislative session in August 2025 at President Trump’s public urging, and the Missouri House and Senate passed it within two weeks. Kehoe signed it into law on Sept. 28, 2025: “I was proud to officially sign the Missouri First Map into law today ahead of the 2026 midterm election,” he said, crediting “the support and efforts of state legislators, our congressional delegation, and President Trump in getting this map to my desk.”
GREAT Governor Mike Kehoe, of the Wonderful State of Missouri, which I love and won SIX times, including with 1.8 Million Votes in 2024 (by far the most Votes in History!), just called a very Special Session to begin passage of a new, much fairer, and much improved, Congressional Map, that will give the incredible people of Missouri the tremendous opportunity to elect an additional MAGA Republican in the 2026 Midterm Elections — A HUGE VICTORY for our America First Agenda, not just in the 'Show-Me State,' but across our Nation... THANK YOU MISSOURI - MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
Verbatim, via trumpstruth.org archive of the verified @realDonaldTrump Truth Social account
Wednesday’s referendum ruling is the second time a Missouri court has cleared the map. In March, a Jackson County judge held the map did not violate the state constitution’s compactness requirement, rejecting a separate lawsuit — Wise v. State of Missouri, later paired with a companion case, Healey v. State— that argued splitting Kansas City three ways made the 5th District impermissibly non-compact. The Missouri Supreme Court affirmed that ruling unanimously on May 12, 2026, in an opinion by Chief Justice W. Brent Powell.
A parallel federal lawsuit, filed by the ACLU, the Campaign Legal Center and the NAACP, makes a related but distinct claim — that using Troost Avenue as a district line amounts to unconstitutional racial gerrymandering. That case is still pending, but the Republican National Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee formally intervened in May 2026 to defend the map, arguing the U.S. Supreme Court’s own 2026 ruling striking down a race-predominant Louisiana map cuts against the plaintiffs, not for them. NRCC Chairman Richard Hudson (R-NC) framed the fight as fairness, not partisanship: “The people of Missouri deserve fair and equal representation, not a partisan power grab designed to silence voters and overturn a lawfully enacted map.”
Cleaver has never disputed that the map targets his seat — only that it is legal. “I strongly disagree that splitting the largest city in our state, Kansas City, into three separate and vastly different congressional districts is compact,” he said when the map first passed. “Using the traditional racial dividing line of Troost Avenue as the new western border of the 5th District is simply egregious.”
Missouri’s fight is one piece of an unusually large mid-decade redistricting wave. As of January 2026, the U.S. House sat at 218 Republicans to 213 Democrats, with four vacancies — a margin thin enough that a single seat can matter. At least five states — Texas, California, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio — passed new mid-decade congressional maps between the 2024 and 2026 elections, alongside court-ordered changes in Utah. Texas moved first, launching the fight in a summer special session that Gov. Greg Abbott signed into law on Aug. 29, 2025, targeting five additional Republican seats. California had already countered by then: Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a Democratic-drawn map on Aug. 21, 2025, targeting five additional Democratic seats, later ratified by a Nov. 4, 2025 ballot measure.
Missouri’s map is worth one net Republican seat in isolation — Cleaver’s — but it now carries outsized legal significance as the first mid-cycle map to survive both a compactness challenge and a referendum challenge in the same election cycle, a precedent other Republican legislatures are likely to point to going forward. DCCC Chair Suzan DelBene (D-WA) called the map illegitimate when it first passed: “Despite bipartisan opposition, the majority of Republicans in Jefferson City have once again chosen to ignore the will of Missouri voters… all options, including legal action and the referendum process, are on the table to ensure fair maps.” A year later, both of those options have now failed in court.
Von Glahn’s appeal goes next to the Missouri Supreme Court — the same seven-justice court that already upheld the map’s compactness in May. A ruling is expected before Missouri’s roughly Sept. 8 deadline to certify the November general-election ballot, which will settle whether voters get any say on the map before Election Day.
If the ruling stands, Cleaver and Brattin will contest the redrawn 5th District in November as the marquee race on Missouri’s ballot — the only Missouri U.S. House seat either party considers competitive, and one of a relatively small number of House races nationally where control of a single seat could matter to which party holds the chamber’s majority come January 2027.
Cole County Judge Daniel Green ruled Aug. 19, 2026 that Missouri’s referendum process does not reach congressional redistricting, clearing the GOP-drawn “Missouri First Map” — signed by Gov. Mike Kehoe (R-MO) in September 2025 — for the November election over a 300,000-signature petition Secretary of State Denny Hoskins (R-MO) had already rejected. It is the second court to uphold the map since a unanimous May 12, 2026 Missouri Supreme Court ruling on a separate compactness challenge. The map cracks Rep. Emanuel Cleaver II’s (D-MO-5) Kansas City district three ways along Troost Avenue and rebuilds it around 14 rural Republican counties. Plaintiff Richard von Glahn has appealed to the Missouri Supreme Court, with a ruling expected before Missouri’s roughly Sept. 8 ballot-certification deadline.
