The Texas Redistricting Cases are Likely the Next Big Voting Cases to Come to the Supreme Court

With the North Carolina voting case gone, I’ve seen some suggestions that the Texas voter id case is the next big voting rights case to make it to SCOTUS.

I don’t think that’s right. That case won’t be decided by the district court until summer at the earliest, and then there will be a Fifth Circuit appeal and possible en banc, followed by discretionary review by the Supreme Court.

But the longrunning Texas congressional and House redistricting case is headed to SCOTUS, directly from a three judge court on a mandatory appeal. It has everything in it: Voting Rights Act violations, racial gerrymandering, a finding of intentional racial discrimination in voting (with a dissent from Judge Jerry Smith saying it is all about party, not race), and potentially the imposition of preclearance by that Court on the next round of Texas redistricting.

This will be a big one, and it could make it to the court by the middle of next term, with our without Justice Kennedy.

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