By Matt Tracy

(Reuters) -Pro-democracy activists and labor groups held hundreds of rallies and other events across the United States on Saturday protesting the Trump administration’s push for Texas to redraw its congressional map in favor of Republicans.

Former Congressman Beto O’Rourke was among those who spoke on Saturday in Texas, from which dozens of Democratic state lawmakers fled to deny Republicans the quorum needed to vote on a redistricting plan that President Donald Trump had demanded.

“They do this because they are afraid,” O’Rourke told an audience on Saturday, speaking of those attempting redistricting. “They fear this power they see here today.” 

Drucilla Tigner, executive director of pro-democracy coalition Texas For All, told Reuters pro-democracy and labor groups held over 300 events attended by tens of thousands of people in 44 states and Washington, D.C.

Many of the more than 50 Texas Democrats who fled the state have been staying in Illinois, also the site of protests on Saturday. The Texas lawmakers in Illinois are out of reach of civil arrest warrants that could be acted on within Texas.

The Texas Democrats kept the map from coming to a vote during a special session Governor Greg Abbott called that ended Friday. Abbott immediately called a second special session.

Abbott said that redistricting plans, legislation to increase flash flood safety in the wake of deadly July flooding, and other legislative work remains undone because Democrats are absent.

California’s Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom on Thursday unveiled a redistricting plan in his state that he says would give Democrats there five more Congressional seats, possibly offsetting any Republican gains in Texas.

The Texas House Democrats said in a written statement on Thursday that they will only return to Texas if their state’s special legislation is ended and once California’s redistricting maps were introduced.

(Reporting by Matt Tracy; Editing by Donna Bryson and Kim Coghill)