Emanuel Cleaver II

Unless courts intervene, it's looking more likely that Missouri voters will ultimately get to decide the fate of the GOP's congressional map — meaning the gerrymandered districts might not take effect for the 2026 election cycle.

As frustration grows around the weekslong government shutdown, Kansas City-area U.S. Reps. Mark Alford and Emanuel Cleaver II can’t see eye-to-eye on a solution that will benefit their constituents. The two Congress members joined KCUR’s Up To Date to debate what's causing the gridlock in Washington.

Si el cierre del gobierno federal continúa, el Consejo Regional de Mid-America ha declarado que podría verse obligado a cerrar temporalmente los centros de enseñanza preescolar Head Start que atienden a más de 2,300 niños de la Ciudad de Kansas City a partir del 1 de noviembre.

If the federal government shutdown continues, the Mid-America Regional Council said it may need to temporarily close Head Start centers serving more than 2,300 Kansas City children beginning Nov. 1.

Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway is arguing that the referendum is usurping the legislature's power to redraw congressional districts. But lawyers with the anti-redistricting group say Hanaway is "absolutely wrong" about the constitution.

Gov. Mike Kehoe has repeatedly said the plan was drafted in his office. A filing by the attorney general's office says only that "various governmental actors" worked on the plan to give a seat to the GOP.

The state's new congressional map uses Troost Avenue as a dividing line, and groups majority Black neighborhoods in east Kansas City with rural communities in the middle of the state. Community leaders worry the new divide will mean the needs of underserved urban neighborhoods go ignored.

The fourth lawsuit to be filed over the recent redistricting plan, this one argues that the Missouri Constitution does not allow lawmakers to revise congressional districts without new census data. It also argues that the districts are not legal because they stretch for hundreds of miles across the state.

The new map breaks the Kansas-City-based district of Democrat Emmanuel Cleaver into three in an effort to make it more Republican-leaning. It's already facing a torrent of legal challenges plus an initiative petition campaign to defeat it at the ballot.

At an event in Columbia, Gov. Mike Kehoe said he is confident he was on firm legal ground when he called lawmakers into a special session to redraw maps to benefit Republicans. But with three lawsuits pending, the governor said it was up to the courts to prove him right.

Redistricting opponents argue that the Missouri Constitution doesn't authorize mid-decade redistricting. But defenders of the gerrymandered map are banking on a construction similar to the 1990s movie "Air Bud."

The special session featured a number of unprecedented actions that would have been unthinkable just a few months ago, when President Trump demanded that Republican leaders redraw the state's congressional lines.