This isn’t the first time Charles Munger Jr. has fought to safeguard California’s independent redistricting.

When a suit filed by Arizona Republicans to disband their state’s commission threatened to topple California’s five-year-old panel, Munger rallied his former allies and braced for battle.

“I’m a redistricting reform zealot,” he told the Los Angeles Times in 2015.

Now, Munger is launching a new crusade, squaring off against Gov. Gavin Newsom and California Democrats in a November race that could reshape the rest of President Donald Trump’s term and the future of gerrymandering reform.

Newsom is leading the push to convince voters to allow his party to temporarily override congressional maps drawn by the Munger-backed commission to create as many as five new US House seats for Democrats. The governor has argued California must “fight fire with fire” after Republicans in Texas and other states redrew their US House maps at the behest of Trump, who is trying to prevent Democrats from regaining House control in next year’s midterm elections.

If Proposition 50 passes, the state would reimplement independent congressional lines in 2031. But Munger and other critics argue the measure would permanently undermine attempts to end gerrymandering.

Munger, who spent more than a decade as a dominating force in California politics before stepping back in 2016, has already spent more than $30 million to defend the reforms he helped pass more than 15 years ago.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks about the “Election Rigging Response Act” at a press conference at the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles, California, on August 14, 2025.