Ahead of this year’s midterm election, Republicans in the Texas Legislature pushed through a controversial — and unconventional — redrawing of the state’s congressional maps.
The goal? Pick up as many as five U.S. House seats for Republicans.
One of the biggest targets was the 34th Congressional District in South Texas, which now includes much of Corpus Christi.
Had the new district lines been in place back in 2024 — the 34th would have gone to President Donald Trump by 10 points. But now, it’s among the state’s most competitive congressional races.
Democratic incumbent Vicente Gonzalez is fighting to keep his seat against Republican challenger Eric Flores, who’s been endorsed by Trump.
The outcome of this race could depend on whether the South Texas voters who backed the president in 2024 will once again vote Republican.
Back in 2024, before redistricting, South Texas’ Congressional District 34 chose both Trump for president and re-elected Democratic Congressman Vicente Gonzalez.
He’s represented several congressional districts in South Texas over the past decade.
If re-elected, Gonzalez told KEDT News his top priority will be lowering food and gas prices and fixing all that’s tied up in.
"We got to get rid of these tariffs that are raising prices of everything," he said. "We got to figure out how to open up the straits of Hormuz without, without you know, going into war and at the same time saving face, right, and and bringing energy prices down. If we bring energy prices down, we'll bring food prices down."
While Gonzalez successfully won re-election in South Texas before, he only held onto his seat by around 5,000 votes in 2024.
Then, a year later, came redistricting.
Corpus Christi attorney, historian and political commentator Dr. Bill Chriss explained how redrawing district lines can benefit a party.
"The redistricting or gerrymandering, depending on how you want to look at it, was done in between censuses by the Texas Legislature, which is unprecedented, right," he said. "And the idea was, President Trump says, ‘Give me four or five more congressional seats out of Texas by redrawing the boundaries.’”
So the people in the Democrats district changed. The new map created a new political landscape.
Del Mar College political science professor, Paul Gottemoller, said adding much of Corpus Christi to the 34th was a strategic move against Gonzalez.
"The hope was that because he wasn't representing Nueces County, he wouldn't have that built-in constituency already," he said.
The Congressman does have some roots in the city, like attending Del Mar College, where he earned an associates degree in banking and finance.
"Vicente actually probably got the best/worst gerrymander you could get," Gottemoller said. "Like, it was more advantageous than most of the other people."
Challenging the incumbent is Republican Eric Flores. He’s a former South Texas-based federal prosecutor and national guardsman.
Flores was endorsed by President Trump. He also won the Republican nomination despite a crowded primary field that included candidates much more established and known to GOP voters.
For this story, the Republican declined KEDT News' interview request. But Flores did speak with KEDT back in December of 2025, when he first announced he was running to represent the 34th.
"Why i'm jumping in it's it's rather simple," Flores said. "You know, we need effective advocates to go up to D.C. to successfully bring legislation for the Southern District of Texas."
At the time, he cited his background and said, if elected, his number one priority would be border security.
"President Trump has brought down, you know, the apprehensions to an all-time low," Flores said. "That being said, we need to continue that because once we have border security, what does that bring? That brings safer communities."
Despite their obvious differences, there are some things both the Republican and Democrat agree on. Gonzalez is known for breaking with fellow Democrats on several issues.
"All those votes that I take on energy, on guns, on trans kids in girls' sports, these are all votes that reflect the values of this congressional district," Gonzalez said.
This year, its obvious that both parties are eyeing the area. Over the summer, the Texas Democrat Party held its state convention in Corpus Christi.
More recently, Republicans have sent their biggest leaders to the Port for campaign stops. Like U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson and, of course, President Donald Trump.
Chriss says that’s an effort to keep the support from Latino voters the Republican Party spent a long time cultivating.
"The Bush family made a concerted effort to cultivate hispanic voters and were pretty successful in doing so," he said. "And then the republican party, during the trump era, made significant inroads into the hispanic south Texas community as a result of their sort of culture wars platform."
But Gottemoler says some of the South Texas voters who backed Trump in 2024 weren’t committed Republicans.
"Many of those new voters that came in may have been people who were up to grab for grabs, were kind of just generally unaffiliated, just your lower propensity voters who are not as engaged in politics, and they showed up to vote in 2024 for Donald Trump. Will they be back again in 2026 is the big question," he said.
The answer to that question could help decide who represents the 34th congressional district in Congress.
