A few months ago, a three judge court held that North Carolina’s congressional redistricting included an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. This case is currently on appeal to the Supreme Court. To remedy the violation, the NC legislature came up with a new plan, that legislators pretty much admitted was a partisan gerrymander. A group of objectors then went back to the district court, objecting to the remedy as a partisan gerrymander.
In this short opinion, the three-judge court unanimously rejected the objection, while leaving open the possibility of future attacks on the plan. Part of the problem is that the plaintiffs were vague in their allegations, but more importantly plaintiffs offered the court no standard to judge whether the plan was a partisan gerrymander, following Justice Kennedy’s controlling opinion for the Supreme Court in the Vieth case.
“While we find our hands tied, we note that it may be possible to challenge redistricting plans when partisan considerations go ‘too far,’” the judges stated in the ruling. “But it is presently obscure what ‘too far’ means.”
The challengers, the judges stated, had not provided the court with a “suitable standard” for deciding that. “Therefore, it does not seem, at this stage, that the Court can resolve this question based on the record before it,” the ruling stated. “…The Court reiterates that the denial of the plaintiffs’ objections does not constitute or imply an endorsement of or foreclose any additional challenges” to the redrawn maps.