Republican redistricting in Texas and Florida may not turn out as Trump had hoped

HARLINGEN, Texas (AP) — Eric Flores, a former federal prosecutor and Army National Guard infantry captain, was one of the Republican Party's prized recruits in this year's midterm elections. With help from a redrawn congressional map in Texas, he seemed primed to dislodge longtime Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez in a region that swung toward Donald Trump in the last presidential election.

Now he's one of several candidates locked in a tougher race than originally envisioned as Republican-run states heeded Trump's call to begin an unusual round of redistricting to help retain control of the U.S. House.

Republicans hoped to pick up as many as nine seats between Texas and Florida. However, even though the districts were redrawn to make them easier to win, the party remains weighed down by dissatisfaction with Trump, the economy, the war with Iran and the president's deportation agenda.

The political landscape remains competitive enough that Vice President JD Vance is traveling to Texas on Wednesday, where he'll appear with Flores, and then visit Florida on Thursday.

House Democrats' national campaign chair, Rep. Suzan DelBene, recently circulated through Florida districts that Republicans were hoping to claim for themselves.

“Republicans arrogantly thought they were going to redistrict seats to pick up more,” DelBene said in an interview during her trip. “Instead, what they have is people across the state souring on the Republican agenda.”

Mike Marinella, House Republicans’ campaign spokesman, said the party can still capitalize this year “with a more favorable map, historic fundraising and spending advantages, stronger candidates and a common-sense agenda.”

Republicans won 25 of Texas’ 38 seats in the U.S. House as Trump returned to power two years ago. Partially using that election as a baseline, the redrawn map was intended to help Republicans win up to 30 seats.

Key to this plan was the Rio Grande Valley, a heavily Latino region on the southern tip of Texas, which had shifted toward Trump.

Texas’ 34th Congressional District, where Flores is running, includes some of the valley, and it opted for Trump by 10 points over Democrat Kamala Harris. But Flores said he expected his race to be close, which he credits to his opponent's five terms in office.

Flores received Trump's endorsement, still pinned to his X account, and spoke at his unusual midterm convention in Dallas. But he also removed from his website a promise to “SUPPORT PRESIDENT TRUMP’S AGENDA" as he looked toward general election voters and widening his base of support.

“If I tell them the red meat issues or I tell them, you know, oh, Republican, Democrat, or anything like that, you lose them,” he told The Associated Press. “I just sell them myself, sell them what I stand for.”

Republicans in Washington acknowledge that inflation, Trump's tariffs and the war in Iran have made their path harder. Latino voters’ discontent with Trump’s immigration agenda further scrambles their efforts.

Republicans are also facing the potential loss of an incumbent who represents a redrawn district. Rep. Monica De La Cruz, who is running for a third term, faces a strong challenge from musician Bobby Pulido. A Latin Grammy winner whose top song on Spotify has 619 million streams, Pulido doesn’t face the usual first-time candidates’ challenge of establishing name ID.

“I want a picture!” Eloise Ibarra, 42, exclaimed as Pulido walked through the crowd at a high school football game. Ibarra later said she'd “probably” vote for Pulido after sitting out the last presidential race.

“I don’t really like his policies,” she said about Trump. “It’s very expensive, I go to the grocery store and buy $50 worth of stuff and it’s like five items.”

Democrats argue that Republicans miscalculated this year.

“I think Republicans counted on Hispanics, and they counted on rural Texas, to deliver votes for them, and these are the two places that are hurting the most,” said Terri Burke of the Texas Democratic Party. Speaking of redistricting, she said, "this is really no longer such a slam dunk for the Republicans anywhere.”

Republicans already had 20 out of 28 seats in Florida, and they wanted to boost that to 24 with their new congressional map. But much like in Texas, their plan was based on 2024 results, when voters, including many Latinos, were dissatisfied with Democratic President Joe Biden on the economy and immigration.

Republicans targeted Rep. Kathy Castor in metro Tampa and Rep. Darren Soto in the Orlando area, while putting south Florida Reps. Jared Moskowitz and Debbie Wasserman Schultz into the same district.

Moskowitz shifted to a nearby Republican-leaning district, and Wasserman Schultz ran for another term in a separate, heavily Democratic district. Castor and Soto face longer odds in their redrawn districts, though DelBene believes they have a shot in the current environment.

The new map didn’t stop Pia Dandiya, an Ivy League-educated school principal whose parents immigrated from India, from mounting her first House campaign for Congress.

She’s running in Florida’s 22nd Congressional District, where Trump won by double digits in 2024 and where Republicans had hoped to pit Moskowitz against Wasserman Schultz.

But Dandiya notes that Biden outpaced Trump in the same collection of precincts in 2020, and she calls herself “a happy road warrior” as she travels 150-plus miles between campaign stops.

“The way this district has been drawn just shows yet again that we are living in a world where elected officials are choosing voters instead of voters choosing elected officials, and it should never be that way,” she said. DelBene and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee tapped her as one of their “Red to Blue” priority candidates.

Dandiya said voters' current circumstances matter more than how they voted two years ago.

“Cost of living is not an issue that is exclusively impacting Democrats. It is an issue that is ubiquitous,” she said, adding that she hears the same concerns even in her district's more conservative communities.

Barrow reported from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and Atlanta.

Democratic candidate for congress Bobby Pulido, second from left, attends a football game between Edcouch-Elsa High School and Robert Vela High School, Thursday, Sept. 17, 2026, at Richard R. Flores Stadium in Edinburg, Texas. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

FILE - Democratic candidate for congress Bobby Pulido laughs while speaking with reporters and staff members in the parking lot of Richard R. Flores Stadium, before attending a football game between Edcouch-Elsa High School and Robert Vela High School, Thursday, Sept. 17, 2026, in Edinburg, Texas. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson,File)

This photo taken with a smartphone shows Republican U.S. House candidate Eric Flores door knocks on Sunday, Sept. 18, 2026, in Harlingen, Texas. (AP Photo/Jesse Bedayn)

This photo taken with a smartphone shows Republican U.S. House candidate Eric Flores door knocks on Sunday, Sept. 18, 2026, in Harlingen, Texas. (AP Photo/Jesse Bedayn)

FILE - The Hidalgo County Republican Party Headquarters are seen, Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2026, in McAllen, Texas. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson,File)

ISTANBUL (AP) — Hamas and the allied Islamic Jihad group have agreed to form an unlikely electoral coalition with a former top Fatah official who has close ties to the United Arab Emirates, Israel's closest ally in the Middle East, Palestinian officials told The Associated Press.

The alliance could be well positioned to threaten the dominance of President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah party over the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority — but only if the first national elections in 20 years actually happen, which is very much in doubt.

Abbas has said parliamentary elections will be held Nov. 28 in Gaza and the West Bank. But he has repeatedly delayed elections, most recently in 2021, when Fatah appeared headed for defeat. When Hamas won the last elections, in 2006, Israel and Western countries boycotted its government, fueling months of unrest that led to its takeover of Gaza the following year.

Islamic Jihad deputy Secretary General Mohammed al-Hindi confirmed the formation of the electoral alliance in a rare interview with The Associated Press in Istanbul on Monday. He said it would support “a unified national list” that could be made up of independent figures rather than members of the groups.

It would include a bloc led by Mohammed Dahlan, a former Fatah security chief who was exiled in 2010 after a bitter falling-out with Abbas and had previously been driven from Gaza by Hamas. Dahlan has since cultivated close ties with the UAE, where he serves as an adviser to the ruler.

The UAE was the driving force behind the 2020 Abraham Accords, and Dahlan himself has extensive contacts with U.S. and Israeli officials, making him an unlikely ally for Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which have fought Israel for decades. The alliance appears to be rooted in shared frustration with Abbas.

Abbas’ leadership of the Palestinian Authority, which has limited autonomy over parts of the occupied West Bank, is deeply unpopular among Palestinians who see it as autocratic, corrupt and ineffective.

The 90-year-old Abbas has clung to power since his own mandate expired in 2009, while Hamas continues to control parts of Gaza three years into a brutal war with Israel.

Dimitri Diliani, spokesperson for Dahlan’s Reformist Democratic Faction, stopped short of declaring a formal alliance but confirmed the factions are assembling a list that would transcend their political differences. The Palestinian Authority under Abbas “has failed Gaza and the Palestinian people everywhere,” he said.

He said several other Palestinian groups are also part of the initiative and there are efforts to bring “all other factions and independent professionals into uniting around one national rebuilding program.”

Hamas said in August that Dahlan and Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya had met in Cairo and discussed ways to “end the monopolization of national decision-making and formulate a comprehensive national strategy.”

Hamas and Fatah officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Al-Hindi said the decision to launch the alliance came after attempts to bring together all factions in a “dialogue for internal consensus on the overall Palestinian issue” failed to bear fruit.

There have been multiple attempts over the years to bring Hamas and Islamic Jihad into the Fatah-led Palestine Liberation Organization, the highest body representing the Palestinian cause internationally, but all have foundered.

A main sticking point has been the PLO’s recognition of Israel. While Hamas officials have said they are willing to accept a Palestinian state in Gaza, the West Bank and east Jerusalem — territories Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war — they have stopped short of recognizing Israel, while Islamic Jihad takes a harder line.

Both are considered terrorist groups by the U.S. and other Western countries, which have voiced support for Palestinian democracy over the years while rejecting any government that includes Hamas. Fatah and Hamas are the most popular factions by far, though many Palestinians are frustrated with both.

Al-Hindi said his group — which has historically not participated in elections run by the Palestinian Authority — will not directly run any candidates but will “support a national list that is agreed upon.”

The scheduled elections come at a precarious time.

In the West Bank, attacks by Israeli settlers on Palestinians have intensified. In Gaza, a ceasefire that took effect in October 2025 has halted the heaviest fighting, but the Israeli military has seized control of more of the territory and continued strikes, which it says are in response to threats.

More than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the start of the war, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. Hamas started the war with its Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, in which militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took 251 others hostage.

Under a U.S. plan for implementing the ceasefire, armed Palestinian groups were to give up their weapons while Israel would withdraw from the enclave. Al-Hindi said his group, along with Hamas, had agreed to the plan and blamed Israel for blocking it.

“When Israel’s obligations in the first phase (of the agreement) are achieved, we will move on to talk about the second phase, which includes the issue of weapons,” al-Hindi said.

Islamic Jihad took part in the Oct. 7 attack and held Israeli hostages, but al-Hindi said the group was not involved in planning the attack or given forewarning by Hamas. The night before, he said, Islamic Jihad members held a commemoration of the group’s founding and many stayed up late.

“In the morning, we were surprised by the media reporting what happened, but as a resistance movement, we were quick to participate in these confrontations,” he said.

With tens of thousands dead, Gaza largely reduced to rubble, and most of its population displaced, al-Hindi acknowledged that “some voices began to express doubts and say, ’What has the resistance brought down on the Palestinian people?'”

But he insisted that the Oct. 7 attack had been necessary to prevent the plight of the Palestinians from being completely sidelined as the UAE and other Arab countries had moved to normalize relations with Israel.

He also acknowledged that Iran — long a main source of support for Palestinian militant groups — is now preoccupied by the ongoing war and a U.S. economic blockade. But al-Hindi said his group will continue with or without Iranian support.

“As long as there is no political horizon to solve the Palestinian issue and attempts continue to flee from the Palestinian cause in the region, the future will be resistance,” he said.

Associated Press writer Josef Federman in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Islamic Jihad deputy Secretary General Mohammed al-Hindi talks during an interview with The Associated Press in Istanbul on Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Emrah Gurel)

Islamic Jihad deputy Secretary General Mohammed al-Hindi talks during an interview with The Associated Press in Istanbul on Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Emrah Gurel)

Islamic Jihad deputy Secretary General Mohammed al-Hindi talks during an interview with The Associated Press in Istanbul on Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Emrah Gurel)

FILE - Palestinian Fatah leader Mohammed Dahlan gestures in his office in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Jan. 3, 2011. (AP Photo/Majdi Mohammed, File)

Islamic Jihad deputy Secretary General Mohammed al-Hindi talks during an interview with The Associated Press in Istanbul on Monday, Sept. 28, 2026. (AP Photo/Emrah Gurel)