California has a record of consistently uplifting the Democratic party. Now, it has the opportunity to continue this tradition and stand up to President Donald Trump.
On Nov. 4, California voters will have Proposition 50 on their ballots. If a majority of voters support Prop 50, the state’s congressional map — which is currently drawn by an independent redistricting commission — will be replaced by one drawn by the state legislature. Prop 50’s maps are an attempt to give California, which is currently represented by 43 Democrats and nine Republicans in the House of Representatives, five more Democratic seats in the House. It would do so by packing urban Democrats into rural, Democratic districts.
While Prop 50 would advantage Democrats, it’s far from an outright power grab. Also known as the Election Rigging Response Act, the California Legislature only sent the measure over to voters after the Texas Legislature redrew its congressional lines. By drawing out up to five of their state’s House Democrats, Texas Republicans were the first to circumvent the traditional redistricting process. Trump tore the process, which historically takes place every 10 years after a census to account for population shifts, into shreds when he declared that his party is “entitled to five more seats” in Texas.
Prop 50 maps would only apply for the state’s 2026, 2028 and 2030 congressional elections — handing redistricting back to its independent commission in 2032. Despite Prop 50 being a relatively short-term change in the grand scheme of the census’s overall history, it’s nevertheless an important response to Trump’s redistricting marching orders. Missouri Republicans already gerrymandered one of their congressional Democrats out, and the Trump administration is pushing Indiana and North Carolina Republicans to do the same. The urgency for California to fight back cannot be overstated.
The Trump plan on redistricting and the Prop 50 response take place in a broader political context: the incumbent president’s party, as seen in 2006, 2010, 2014 and 2018, typically suffers midterm losses in Congress. With how slim the Republican majority is in the House, every seat matters. This could make California voters’ approval of Prop 50 exactly what it takes to give Trump’s victims, such as Stanford and its peer institutions, a fighting chance and put Democrats back in the House in 2026.
Although a Democratic House majority would still be facing a Republican White House, Senate and (some might say) judiciary, it could positively impact students on Stanford’s campus. Given the House’s significant oversight over federal spending, securing a Democratic majority would make it easier to secure research funds Congress has already approved for students. It would make even heavier reductions to Stanford’s budget much harder to effectuate, supporting our humanities faculty and preventing even worse layoffs.
The House’s power to conduct oversight hearings on the executive branch is quite broad. With it, a Democratic House could seriously scrutinize the Department of Homeland Security’s assault on student speech and invasion of student communities, the Department of Education’s violation of sexual assault survivors’ Title IX protections and the Department of Health and Human Services’ wholesale erasure of transgender people from our healthcare system.
The House also must approve all federal legislation before it is passed. This would require Trump to compromise with House Democrats on much of his policy agenda. It won’t reverse his constant attacks on communities and institutions, but on the statutory bases for each of those attacks, Democrats would secure a voice impossible to ignore.
With all that stands on the line for the people and freedoms that make Stanford so special, Prop 50 is a prime opportunity for the Stanford community to meet the moment in our state. While this would resemble Republican gerrymandering at first glance, it is the resistance and harm reduction that their draconian policies call for.
Democratic policies would help the Stanford community — regardless of their political affiliations. Democrats’ support for healthcare benefits the graduate workers struggling to afford their healthcare. Their support for funding higher education benefits the communities whose scholarship Trump seeks to erase. Their opposition to Trump’s crackdown on international students’ free speech rights would provide a much-needed defense for not only the students themselves but also The Stanford Daily itself in their respective First Amendment pursuits. Across the board, the people of Stanford stand to benefit from Democrats gaining power in Congress.
I urge my fellow California voters at Stanford to not only vote for Prop 50 but do all they can to get the California voters in their lives to do the same.
Trump is a clear and present danger to our communities, educational rights and peer institutions. For our community, Prop 50 makes it clear that collective action, not institutional complicity, is the only way forward. For our peer institutions, it lets them know they aren’t alone in the fight. It’s up to us, the people who make Stanford what it is, to push back and support Prop 50.