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What, precisely, is the role of Congress? In the second Trump administration, it is difficult to tell. The power to declare war, long considered a vital congressional authority, has become a murky right of the executive branch in the time since September 11; the president, in the past few months, has asserted even more of that control for himself, authorizing strikes on vessels in the Caribbean Sea.

The power of the purse seems to have largely been stripped from the legislative branch too; now, under the leadership of budget chief, the OMB director, a great deal of the power to allocate government money has likewise defaulted to the executive, with the White House claiming the authority to cancel congressionally authorized expenditures and attempting to move the funds to other uses. It’s as if they’re passing any legislation, either; virtually all bills must now be crammed into spending packages, massive recurring essential omnibus legislation that can circumvent the senate obstruction. But when those don’t pass – and increasingly, they do not – the federal government simply shuts down. At least, big parts of the government do – and it’s uncertain how many citizens are aware. At present, the government has been closed all month; there are no signs of it reopening anytime soon. But the presidency continues operating smoothly.

And so the question of control of the House and Senate can seem somewhat irrelevant. Why should Americans care who has a majority in a body that has largely abolished itself?

How ‘oppose the president’ messaging may help the state of California’s Proposition 50 prevail

And yet Proposition 50, the Golden State’s redistricting referendum that could deliver five additional House seats to the Democratic Party if it is embraced by the electorate in a special election next month, has seized the political imagination of liberals across the country. In part, it is a delayed reaction to trends happening in other states: Republican-controlled states have for a long time embraced extreme partisan gerrymandering while big Democratic-controlled such as the Golden State, New York and the Evergreen State create their maps via impartial redistricting panels, an imbalance that has led to narrowly split House control and a longstanding feeling, by the left, that their party is at a disadvantage. The California measure is clearly designed as a countermove to a mid-term redrawing of maps that was recently approved in the Lone Star State, which installed boundaries that will give the GOP an five more positions in the state’s House representation in the upcoming term; similar redistricting moves are under way in states such as Missouri and the Hoosier State. (The left in Virginia are also following California’s lead in attempting to alter districts.)

The state measure seems probable to be approved, as progressive voters react with fear and frustration to the president’s autocratic consolidation of power and look for ways to check his most extreme tendencies. But Prop 50 is not without debate. Some opponents caution that the move could backfire, with Democratic-controlled states’ efforts to redistrict setting off a revenge pattern in which Republican-controlled states do even more to draw their districts so as to eliminate any chance of Democratic competitiveness. Others have questioned the measure on strictly principled pro-democracy grounds: a electoral area that is created in such a manner that the outcome of the election is not in question, they argue, is one that cannot be said to be truly representative: it means, inevitably, that the influence of opposing views is muted, and that the procedure of debate, discussion and convincing that is supposed to characterize a healthy democratic process will be confined only to party primaries, if it occurs at all.

It is valuable taking each of these criticisms on their merits. The initial argument, that the measure will provoke the right to alter their own maps in retaliation, fails as a logical argument: it does not make sense to claim that Republicans will be compelled to behave in antidemocratic ways by Democrats’ measures when they are already engaging in such behavior without those actions. The GOP, I would observe, has required no any incentive of revenge to change maps that secure permanent positions for themselves: they have been willing to do this for their own benefit, in the complete absence of similar actions by the left, for years.

The second objection, in my view, is more significant, reflecting not just a tactical disagreement about how to confront the GOP’s undemocratic shift, but a sort of melancholic desire for a different nation than the one that the US has become. It is true that in a more ideal world – in the reality that most Democrats, I think, desire and aspire to – Prop 50 would be distasteful to our values, and not mandated by our situation. It is undesirable to pack and crack targeted demographics; it is harmful for politicians to select their constituents, instead of the other way around; it is negative that votes are rendered uncontested. That these measures have become essential in order to impede the autocratic creep of Trump’s power and reduce the amount of suffering he is capable to inflict is unfortunate; it is a indication of how far we have declined from something more like a democracy. But they are necessary. It is only once the battle against the current administration’s ideology has been successfully concluded that we can lament what opposing it has transformed us into.

If the legislative branch does not in practice have lawmaking, military or appropriations authority, what is it, precisely, that the proposition’s additional five Democratic house members will be sent to the capital to do? One aspect that Congress still retains is subpoena power, and the power to examine. Even in our time of stagnant government and congressional atrophy, it has made use of that power to great effect. In 2027, if Prop 50 passes and the state’s new representatives are take office, they will become a part of a institution with the authority to probe Trump, to televise their investigations into his conduct and to force members of his close advisors to testify. It’s significant, and more importantly, it’s not something that any Republican would do.

• Moira Donegan is a news outlet writer