Jeffries vows to pressure fellow Democrat holding up state redistricting fight
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Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-Y., vowed to put pressure on Maryland Democratic state Senate President Bill Ferguson, who opposes a Democrat-led plan to redraw the state’s only Republican in the House of Representatives from his district.
“Let’s talk about Maryland, because this is a fight within your own party. Governor Wes Moore supports this plan to essentially remove the lone Republican from his district. It passed the state House, but it’s being held up by someone in the state Senate, the state Senate president Bill Ferguson. Bill Ferguson isn’t bringing this to the floor for a vote,” CNN’s Manu Raju asked during “Domestic Politics.” “Could it cost you the majority? That Democratic state senate president in Maryland?”
Ferguson urged his party to refrain from taking mid-cycle redistricting measures to redraw Maryland’s congressional boundaries in an October letter for fear the process could backfire. Democratic Gov. Wes Moore ignored the Senate president’s warning in November.
“At the end of the day, if that’s the outcome, he’s going to have to live with it,” Jeffries said. “But I don’t think that’s going to be the outcome, because we know we have majority support as we speak in the Maryland state Senate right now. And all we’re asking of Mayor Ferguson is to let democracy prevail.” he replied. “That means vote up or down.”
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) speaks at a press conference at the U.S. Capitol on February 09, 2026 in Washington, DC. Maryland state Senate President Bill Ferguson speaks about the Maryland Opportunity Protection and Regional Trade Act, which he and Senator Johnny Ray Salling sponsored in January 2025. (Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images; Kim Hairston/Baltimore Sun/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
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“Should a man not stand before the people of Maryland through their representatives in the state senate, should we move in that direction, or should we not respond to Donald Trump’s ongoing efforts to rig the midterm elections?” The House minority leader continued.
Jeffries argued that Democrats were taking the issue of gerrymandering to voters compared to what Republicans were doing, saying Republicans were “distributing maps that they were deliberately gerrymandering, often erasing Black or Latino districts in the dead of night.”
“He’s not right,” Jeffries said when asked about Ferguson’s concerns about legal challenges and the potential for legislation to come back to the party.
The House minority leader then promised to put some pressure on Ferguson if he stood in his way.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, DY, walks toward the House Chamber on Capitol Hill on December 18, 2025 in Washington, DC. Lawmakers will return home after the House takes its final votes of 2025 on Thursday, leaving unresolved the end of pandemic-era Obamacare subsidies for millions of Americans at risk of losing health insurance on Jan. 1, 2026. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
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“At some point, if he continues to stand in the way of upvotes or downvotes, I’m going to have to talk to him. But hopefully he’ll change his mind in the next few days,” he said.
Ferguson did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
Jeffries said Democrats are trying to redistrict across the country to ensure “the national map is free and fair.” Texas Republicans successfully passed a new congressional map Five new Republican-leaning counties were added to the state in August.
“And whatever advantage Republicans thought they would gain by gerrymandering in red states across the country, we are ensuring that those advantages are completely and utterly eliminated,” he said.
Maryland Governor Wes Moore in Annapolis, Maryland, on February 7, 2024. (AP Photo/Steve Ruark)
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Raju asked Jeffries how much money Democrats were willing to spend to privately pass the ballot initiative in Virginia. The Virginia Senate voted 21-16 along party lines on Wednesday to pass a set of new congressional maps that would leave only one Republican district in the state in play.
“Whatever it takes,” he replied. “We will spend tens of millions of dollars to ensure that Republicans do not successfully manipulate voters in Virginia and that voters have all the information necessary to decide whether Donald Trump should rig the midterm elections and stop the American people’s ability to decide who is in the majority, or whether it should be up to the people of Virginia and the people of America to decide.”
