Trump's plan to rig the midterms is backfiring 'in a major way': CNN data guru

Last year, President Donald Trump urged Republicans in Texas to draw a new congressional district map five years ahead of schedule. The new GOP-friendly district boundaries were expected to give Republicans a five-seat advantage in this year's midterm elections. But less than a year later, Republicans are actually lagging behind Democrats in the redistricting battle.

That's according to CNN data analyst Harry Enten, who laid out how Democrats have so far out-maneuvered Republicans in congressional redistricting. The Daily Beast reported Thursday that Enten crunched the numbers and estimated Democrats would be roughly one seat ahead after all the smoke has cleared.

In a segment on CNN News Central, Enten told host Kate Bolduan that when factoring in Democratic responses to Texas' gerrymandered maps, Republicans' efforts have so far failed to bear fruit. This includes new maps in Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio that each gave Republicans an additional seat in the House of Representatives.

Democrats in California countered Texas' maps by voting overwhelmingly for Prop 50, which put in place new maps giving Democrats an advantage in five Republican-held districts. And in deep-red Utah, a judge struck an all-Republican redistricting map, giving Democrats an additional seat in the Beehive State.

The GOP's efforts in Indiana also failed, despite Republicans controlling both chambers of the state legislature and Gov. Mike Braun (R) pushing hard for new GOP-friendly maps. And Democrats in blue states like Maryland, New York and Virginia are poised to re-draw their maps to give Democrats an advantage.

"The bottom line is this: it started out as a plus for Republicans, and now it looks like the Democrats have fought back and fought back in a major way," Enten said. "It looks like it‘s going to be a plus for them nationwide."

"If you said to me last summer, Democrats are more likely to gain than Republicans, I wouldn‘t buy it," he continued. "But again, as I said at the start, Donald Trump and the Republicans started this mid-decade redistricting war, but it looks like Democrats are going to finish him off."

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