Ross Ramsey for the Texas Tribune: The court ruled that Texas “may” use population as the basis for the size of its legislative districts. It didn’t say it must, however — that’s not the question the court was asked. Want to … Continue reading
Category Archives: redistricting
Media Matters reports. … Continue reading
Pete Williams and Zack Roth report for NBC News. … Continue reading
Bauer blogs. … Continue reading
Garrett Epps on Evenwel for The Atlantic. … Continue reading
At SCOTUSBlog and How Appealing. … Continue reading
Adam Liptak for the NYT: The Supreme Court unanimously ruled on Monday that states may count all residents, whether or not they are eligible to vote, in drawing election districts. The decision was a major statement on the meaning of … Continue reading
Nina Totenberg reports for NPR’s All Things Considered. … Continue reading
Mark Sherman reports for AP. … Continue reading
A unanimous Supreme Court in Evenwel v. Abbott (with two Justices (Thomas and Alito) concurring in the judgment) has rejected the argument that states must draw district lines so as to equalize the total number of voters (as opposed to total … Continue reading
Ilya Somin: Prominent legal scholar Earl Maltz has an important new article arguing thatReynolds v. Sims (1965) and other Supreme Court decisions requiring state governments to follow the “one person, one vote” rule for apportioning legislative districts cannot be squared … Continue reading
Rob Richie and Austin Plier in WaPo: Change certainly is needed. Maryland’s obviously manipulated congressional districts have produced results that skew in favor of Democrats. Only one of eight seats is held by a Republican, and white male Democrats hold … Continue reading
Wisconsin State Journal: A panel of three federal judges heard arguments Wednesday on a motion to dismiss a lawsuit brought by a group of Democrats who say that the 2011 redistricting of state legislative boundaries was an extreme and illegal … Continue reading
Smart thoughts from Asher Steinberg. … Continue reading
I have posted a revised version of this paper (forthcoming, Stanford Law Review) to take into account the death of Justice Scalia. Here is the revised abstract: This Essay describes the path of election law jurisprudence in the Roberts Court and … Continue reading
I have now had a chance to review the transcript in Wittman v. Personhuballah, and I agree with other commentators that it seems very likely that the Republican intervenors is likely to fail. It appears that the four Court liberals are unlikely … Continue reading
WaPo: The Supreme Court on Monday seemed likely to leave in place a lower court’s decision that Virginia improperly considered race when drawing congressional districts. Operating without the late Justice Antonin Scalia, it would require only four members of the … Continue reading
Alice Ollstein: The Federal District Court for Florida’s Northern District ruled Monday that the prison gerrymandering in Florida’s Jefferson County unconstitutionally dilutes the voting power of its residents. By packing inmates who can’t vote into a district, but counting them … Continue reading
Asher Steinberg: In sum, Personhuballah has the potential to remake standing in election law, moving candidates and their lost chances of electoral success to the forefront of districting litigation where they’ve always belonged. But Personhuballah also has the potential to … Continue reading
Bob Barnes and Jenna Portnoy for WaPo: The Supreme Court will take another shot at that in the Virginia case. A panel of federal judges said the commonwealth’s plan veered from partisan gerrymandering aimed at protecting incumbents — for which the … Continue reading
Here, at SCOTUSBlog. … Continue reading
Must-read NYT Richard Fausset: The purest distillation of the nation’s wars over voting rules and legislative gerrymandering is playing out in North Carolina. A high-profile lawsuit is taking on a voter identification law and other voting changes. There are four … Continue reading
WaPo reports. … Continue reading
That’s the lead story in this week’s Electionline Weekly. … Continue reading
While much of the brief is about how the NC legislature’s new plan is no cure for the earlier redistricting plan found to be a racial gerrymander, perhaps what is most interesting is the discussion of how open and blatant … Continue reading
The latest from NC. … Continue reading
Michael Parsons: In North Carolina, the legislature is attempting to justify a map with a 10-3 split, which does not reasonably reflect statewide voter preference, based on an alleged state interest in political advantage. For reasons I discuss at length … Continue reading
News and Observer: Critics of the congressional redistricting process that took place in 2011, and who successfully sued to overturn it on the basis of racial gerrymandering, on Monday filed a brief in federal court saying they don’t like the … Continue reading
Last night the Supreme Court refused to stay a three-judge district court order which required North Carolina to come up with a new redistricting plan within two weeks which did not constitute a “racial gerrymander” violating the equal protection clause. … Continue reading
Richard Fausset for the NYT: The court ordered the legislature to redraw the maps, and this week, lawmakers set about their work in a special session. But this time, there would be a key difference: Race would not be factored … Continue reading
Lyle Denniston for SCOTUSBlog: Without an explanation, the Supreme Court on Friday night left intact a lower court decision that had forced the North Carolina legislature to draw up a new election district map for congressional seats, to cure “racial gerrymandering” in two of … Continue reading
Ariane de Vogue reports for CNN. … Continue reading
(I knew this would happen while I was (1) on a plane and (2) just finished my ELB blogging for the night.) The Supreme Court, without noted dissent, has denied the stay in the North Carolina redistricting case. What does … Continue reading
Richard Fausset with the evergreen NYT headline. Story: Since Republicans took control of this deeply divided state’s legislature five years ago, Democrats and their allies have complained that Republicans have been illegally changing the rules of the voting game and … Continue reading
Finally a two-state solution that might work! … Continue reading
Here is the state’s letter, asking for a stay despite the passage of the new redistricting plan, based “on the disruption” from the new plan. Here is a letter from plaintiffs. They point out that the state has also moved … Continue reading
WRAL: The elections date measure calls for a June 7 election, unless the U.S. Supreme Court steps in to stay the lower court order that demanded the new maps. So until March 15, candidates running under the maps drawn in … Continue reading
WNCN: The proposed congressional redistricting map would put two incumbents in the same district. Redistricting leader Rep. David Lewis (R-Harnett) said Republican U.S. Rep. George Holding of the 13th and Democratic Rep. David Price of the 4th would live in … Continue reading
Here’s the NC congressional redistricting proposal (via Stephen Wolf) … Continue reading
NYT editorial. … Continue reading
Alice Ollstein writes for Think Progress. … Continue reading
You can read the 60-page response here. The plaintiffs do not address the Purcell principle question until the very end of the brief, where they say: Finally, Purcell v. Gonzalez, 549 U.S. 1 (2006), does not, as Applicants suggest, Motion … Continue reading
KJZZ reports. … Continue reading
I’ve seen many people suggest this, including the NYT’s Adam Liptak: The clearest impact is likely to be in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, No. 14-915, on the power of public unions. When the case was argued in January, it … Continue reading
I have now posted a revised version of Election Law’s Path in the Roberts Court’s First Decade: A Sharp Right Turn but with Speed Bumps and Surprising Twists, forthcoming Stanford Law Review (2016). Though revised, the revision was completed before Justice Scalia’s … Continue reading
I’ve been predicting a stay from the Supreme Court of the district court order, which would stop the current election (already begun with absentees) and have the state quickly redistrict and hold new elections with new district lines. With Justice … Continue reading
To the Point: The Constitution requires that the boundaries of congressional districts be re-drawn every 10 years, according to the latest census. In 2010, Republicans won control of legislatures all over the country—and those GOP lawmakers then collectively increased their … Continue reading
News and Observer: Moore and Senate leader Phil Berger said in a news release that they still hope the U.S. Supreme Court will issue a stay that allows them to avoid a lower court’s deadline next week to produce new … Continue reading
FairVote: Sen. Raskin, a Democrat in a Democratically-controlled legislature, has long suggested the best way to hold congressional elections is with fair representation voting. His new legislation presents a creative way to end the national standoff. He has proposed entering in an … Continue reading
Here. … Continue reading