Brennan Center: During remarks to the Illinois General Assembly today, President Obama called for broad democracy reform, including reducing barriers to voting, implementing automatic voter registration, changing the way our districts are drawn, and seeking reasonable limits on the influence of “dark … Continue reading
Category Archives: redistricting
The response is due Tuesday. UPDATE: More from Lyle. Tuesday seems like a long time to wait, given that there’s uncertainty as absentee ballots are out and are being voted. In the meantime, the Legislature has to consider drafting an … Continue reading
NC Policy Watch reports. … Continue reading
North Carolina has filed this emergency stay request with Chief Justice Roberts. The three-judge lower court has denied the stay filed in that court. I think the Supreme Court is very likely to grant the stay even if, as likely, it … Continue reading
Read it here (via NC Policy Watch). … Continue reading
Due soon, BAN reports. That means probably a quick ruling from the 3-judge court, and then the state will go on to SCOTUS if the lower court does not grant a stay. … Continue reading
Daily Kos: Late on Friday afternoon, a federal court hearing a challenge to North Carolina’s congressional map found that Republicans drew two districts, the 1st and the 12th, in violation of the constitution because they’d impermissibly used race as the … Continue reading
The Charlotte Observer reports. … Continue reading
.@NCHouseSpeaker office says appeal & motion for stay likely filed today. Gov could call them into special session next week. #ncga #ncpol — Craig Jarvis (@CraigJ_NandO) February 8, 2016 See my earlier prediction that such a stay is likely to … Continue reading
Charlotte Observer: The day after a panel of federal judges invalidated two of North Carolina’s 13 congressional districts, state elections officials were working on a Saturday afternoon to encourage voters with absentee ballots to vote the full ballot anyway. Kim … Continue reading
See here. I expect the state’s lawyers are spending the weekend drafting an emergency motion to SCOTUS to stay this ruling for the March election, given that absentee ballots are already out. I would not at all be surprised to see … Continue reading
The 100 pages of opinions are here. One of the three judges dissented as to one of the two districts. If North Carolina wishes, it could seek direct Supreme Court review. There is already a Virginia case raising similar issues … Continue reading
The Arizona Capitol Times reports. … Continue reading
News from Maryland. … Continue reading
NYT reports. … Continue reading
Good news from Jeff Wice: I have volunteered to begin updating Justin Levitt’s “All About Redistricting” website. (see http://redistricting.lls.edu/) while he is at the Department Of Justice. I am undertaking this effort with colleagues at SUNY Buffalo Law School (where I serve … Continue reading
Roll Call: Virginia’s election officials urged the Supreme Court on Thursday to keep in place a new, judge-selected redistricting plan for this year’s congressional elections, putting the officials at odds with 10 current and former members of the state’s Republican … Continue reading
Eliza: Having dropped the ball on virtually every good government proposal that he pledged to enact when he first ran for office, President Barack Obama has now zeroed in on an unlikely new target for his democracy agenda: redistricting reform. … Continue reading
Roll Call: Ten current and former Republican members of Congress asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to stop a new, judge-selected redistricting plan in Virginia or risk the state having to postpone congressional elections. The Chief Justice requested a response … Continue reading
Interesting from the LA Times: President Obama used his last State of the Union address to push for national voting reforms and went off script to specifically call for bipartisan groups to draw new congressional districts instead of lawmakers. “I think we’ve got to end the … Continue reading
AP: A federal court has picked a new congressional map for Virginia that significantly changes the racial makeup of two districts, but could be overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court. A three-judge panel on Thursday ordered the state to implement … Continue reading
[Bumping to the top for the new year.] I expect a lot of litigation over election issues in 2016, including emergency last minute litigation making it to the Supreme Court as part of what Will Baude calls the Supreme Court’s … Continue reading
Emily Bazelon and Jim Rutenberg discuss the Evenwel case at the New York Times Magazine, as part of their “Disenfranchised” Series. Thanks to them for linking to a couple of my posts on this “one person, one vote” case. … Continue reading
The Miami Herald reports: A judge on Wednesday approved a new map of Florida’s 40 Senate districts drawn by a coalition of voting rights groups, dealing yet another political and legal setback to the Republican-controlled Legislature. … Continue reading
The latest from Fla. … Continue reading
See here. … Continue reading
Durango Herald: A proposed ballot question that would change congressional redistricting in Colorado is being rewritten to address concerns raised by black and Latino voters. The bipartisan proposal has caused a bit of a rift within the Colorado Democratic Party, … Continue reading
Which states shall gain, and which shall lose, in the next round of congressional apportionment? (If current trends hold.) … Continue reading
You can find 129 pages of opinions here. I expect a cert. petition. … Continue reading
A partisan gerrymandering claim challenging Wisconsin’s redistricting of its general assembly has survived a motion to dismiss before a three-judge federal court. This is a bigger deal than might first appear. The state of play in partisan gerrymandering claims is … Continue reading
Kathay Feng blogs. … Continue reading
Thomas Berry has posted this draft on SSRN (forthcoming, NYU Journal of Law and Liberty). Here is the abstract: Since the 1964 case of Reynolds v. Sims, states have been constitutionally required under the Equal Protection Clause to draw their legislative … Continue reading
Dan Tokaji has posted this draft on SSRN (forthcoming, Election Law Stories). Here is the abstract; Justice William Brennan’s opinion in Thornburg v. Gingles is among the most consequential and enduring in the election law canon. Gingles established a three-part test … Continue reading
Jost on Justice. … Continue reading
Tony Mauro fascinating column on Evenwel. … Continue reading
On the Slate Amicus podcast. … Continue reading
Richmond Times-Dispatch: A three-judge federal panel in Richmond might choose a fix for the constitutionally flawed 3rd congressional district, but make its imposition of a new map conditional on a later ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court. U.S. District Judge … Continue reading
Reader reactions to my recent LAT oped on Evenwel. … Continue reading
Janai Nelson at Hamilton and Griffin on Rights: Nothing is sacred in politics; but certain things should be sacred in a democracy. The Supreme Court argument in Evenwel v. Abbott this past Wednesday proved that not even the well-worn principle … Continue reading
Lyle Denniston writes at Constitution Daily. … Continue reading
Bauer blogs. … Continue reading
Very thoughtful opinion, including a discussion of the level of scrutiny to apply to a OPOV claim. … Continue reading
NYT editorial on Evenwel. … Continue reading
Ross Ramsey in the Texas Tribune: Some people think it’s unfair to have more eligible voters in one legislative district than in another — that basing things solely on total population is the wrong way to draw political maps. But … Continue reading
Noah Feldman writes for Bloomberg View. … Continue reading
From yesterday’s argument: [Texas SG Scott Keller]:…If the Court were to try to go down the road of requiring States to equalize within 10 percent of a deviation, both total and voter population, States would inevitably have to disregard many other traditional redistricting factors, like compactness, continuity, keeping communities together. And that would be the opposite of what the Court has said that States have in this context, which is the leeway to structure their elections as part of the core function of their sovereignty. JUSTICE KENNEDY: That sounds highly probable to me. Has anything been written on this, or any studies on this MR. KELLER: I don’t JUSTICE KENNEDY: in the context of Texas. MR. KELLER: I don’t believe so. We’re not aware of any. And we’re also not aware that this would be practically feasible… There is a study, a … Continue reading
Monkey Cage: On Tuesday, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case Evenwel v. Abbott. The main issue in the case is who must be counted when district lines are drawn. The “one person, one vote” principle in operation … Continue reading
Justice Scalia is not shy about expressing his opinion. He had plenty to say in the oral argument yesterday in the Harris redistricting case. He spoke at today’s Fisher affirmative action argument as well. But at yesterday’s Evenwel oral argument … Continue reading
I have written this oped on Evenwel for the LA Times oped page. It begins: At the Supreme Court on Tuesday, the justices struggled over the meaning of the 1960s-era “one person, one vote” rule. Should Texas legislative districts contain … Continue reading