SUGAR LAND, Texas — Texas politics could be headed for another round of redistricting, and Fort Bend County may be one of the places where the consequences are most visible.
That was one of the central messages from Rice University political scientist Dr. Mark Jones, who spoke to Fort Bend South Asian United’s audience about redistricting, voting rights and the political landscape heading into the 2026 election and 2027 legislative session.
Jones, a fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy and co-director of its Presidential Elections Program, walked through the legal changes affecting redistricting and used Fort Bend County as a case study for how partisan mapmaking could reshape political representation.
Here are five takeaways from his presentation.
1. Fort Bend could be a major target in the next redistricting fight
Jones said Fort Bend is particularly significant because of its size, political competitiveness and demographic diversity.
The county currently has five Texas House districts, with two Democrats and three Republicans representing districts that include portions of Fort Bend County.
But Jones and researcher Michael Adams conducted a redistricting exercise showing that a map could potentially be drawn to produce four Republican-leaning districts and one Democratic district.
The hypothetical map was not presented as a prediction of what lawmakers will do, Jones said, but as an illustration of what could be possible under the current legal environment.
One of the biggest changes is the reduced protection for coalition districts under recent voting-rights case law. That gives mapmakers more flexibility to rearrange districts along partisan lines.
For Fort Bend, Jones said, that could mean a Democratic-leaning district becoming Republican-leaning without necessarily requiring dramatic changes to the county’s overall geographic boundaries.
2. The 2026 election could determine how aggressive Republicans can be in 2027
Republicans currently hold an 86-64 majority in the Texas House.
Jones expects Republicans to retain control after the 2026 election, but said the size of that majority matters.
A smaller Republican majority would make an aggressive redistricting effort more difficult because Republican lawmakers themselves could become vulnerable under new maps.
Unlike the 2025 mid-decade redistricting of Texas’ congressional districts, state House members whose districts are redrawn would have to vote on the legislation.
“That is going to have a lot of pushback from some Republicans who may say, ‘Yes, this may help us win more seats, but is it going to make me more vulnerable?’” Jones said.
The closer Republicans get to a 75-seat majority, he said, the harder it becomes to pursue an aggressive partisan map because fewer lawmakers can afford to sacrifice the security of their own districts.
3. Voting-rights protections have changed the mapmaking equation
Jones spent much of his presentation explaining how the Voting Rights Act has changed since the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in Shelby County v. Holder.
He said Section 2 protections remained important when Texas drew its maps in 2021, limiting the ability of mapmakers to weaken minority voters’ ability to elect candidates of their choice.
But subsequent court decisions have changed the legal landscape, particularly regarding coalition districts made up of multiple racial or ethnic minority groups.
Jones said that means mapmakers now have more freedom to use partisan considerations when drawing districts.
Race, however, remains legally problematic.
“If you’re drawing these districts, you can’t use race,” Jones said. “Use partisanship when you’re drawing the districts.”
The distinction could be especially important in Fort Bend, where no single racial or ethnic group dominates the population and where Asian American voters make up a significant portion of the electorate.
4. Fort Bend’s Asian American population makes the county politically unusual
Jones described Fort Bend as effectively a purple county, with Democrats holding a slight overall partisan advantage in recent election results.
He also highlighted the county’s unusual demographic composition, describing it as one of the most diverse counties in the country, with four significant racial and ethnic groups making up substantial portions of the population.
Within the county’s Asian American population, Jones cited American Community Survey estimates showing roughly 45% South Asian, about one-quarter Chinese and another significant portion Vietnamese, with other Asian national-origin groups making up the remainder.
Those demographics create a complicated redistricting picture.
A mapmaker cannot legally draw districts simply to favor or disadvantage a racial group. But partisan geography can have racial consequences, particularly in a county where race, ethnicity and political affiliation overlap in complicated ways.
Jones said that creates a potential legal fault line: A map drawn on a partisan basis may be permissible, while evidence that race itself was used as the motivating factor could create legal problems.
5. Texas may be more competitive in 2026, but turnout will matter
Jones also offered a broader assessment of the 2026 election and said Texas is potentially more competitive than it has been in years.
He pointed to President Donald Trump’s approval ratings, the Republican nomination of Ken Paxton for U.S. Senate and the amount of national attention now focused on Texas as factors that could make the state more competitive.
Texas, he said, has moved into the conversation as one of the Republican-held Senate seats Democrats could potentially flip.
But Jones cautioned against assuming that increased competitiveness automatically means Democrats will win statewide.
Turnout remains the key variable.
He said Democrats currently appear to have the more motivated electorate, while some voters who supported Trump in 2024 may be less enthusiastic about turning out in 2026.
That makes the election unusually volatile.
“There are very few true independents anymore,” Jones said, estimating that roughly 10% to 15% of likely voters are truly independent and genuinely move between the parties.
For Fort Bend, the turnout question could have consequences well beyond November.
The voters who show up in 2026 will help determine not only who represents the county in Austin and Washington, but also the political conditions under which lawmakers could redraw the state’s political maps in 2027.
And if Fort Bend County’s own political balance changes, Jones said, redistricting could become a local issue as well.
“If we have essentially a three-two Democratic majority on Commissioners Court,” Jones said, there could also be an opportunity for redistricting at the county level.
For a county already sitting at the intersection of rapid growth, demographic change and competitive politics, the next election cycle could therefore shape more than the names on the ballot.
It could shape the map itself.