The redistricting provisions of the Freedom to Vote Act have a number of differences from the earlier For the People Act. Some of them are BIG. A thread 🧵 #fairmaps 1/
First, the partisan gerrymandering section now has a rebuttable presumption that a plan violates the anti-gerrymandering clause if certain metrics are met. A party can ask the court to determine whether the presumption has been triggered by filing a motion. #fairmaps 2/
If a party makes such motion, the court must hold a hearing within 15 days and conduct an assessment using the two most recent presidential and Senate elections in the state. #fairmaps 3/
If the court determines that the rebuttable presumption has been triggered, a state is *automatically* barred from using its map until the partisan gerrymandering claim can be litigated in full and the state successfully rebuts the presumption. #fairmaps 4/
If the case cannot be resolved in time for the next primary election, the court is directed to adopt an interim map and/or make adjustments to the primary schedule to allow for resolution of the claim. #fairmaps 5/
Then there are big changes to how redistricting cases get litigated. Cases could be brought *either* in the federal district court in the state capital OR in Washington DC, with the exception that partisan gerrymandering cases could *only* be brought in DC. #fairmaps 6/
Redistricting cases challenging a congressional plan on a statewide basis would continue to be heard by 3-judge panels under section 2284, BUT appeals would go to the DC Circuit instead of directly to SCOTUS. #fairmaps 7/
SCOTUS could hear redistricting cases on appeal from the DC Circuit but the appeal would be through the certiorari process rather than as an appeal under its mandatory jurisdiction. #fairmaps 8/
This would create an appellate structure similar to how patent appeals work. Cases get litigated in district courts all around the country but appeals are then funneled through the Federal Circuit in Washington. #fairmaps 9/
There are also a number of smaller but significant changes. One is a provision making clear states cannot use state criteria or policies (such as incumbent protection or preserving the cores of districts) as an excuse for non-compliance with the bill’s map rules. #fairmaps 10/
This is a perpetual fight in redistricting cases right now. States routinely defend discriminate maps with excuses like, we were just trying to ensure that districts are maximally compact or that we didn’t pair incumbents. #fairmaps 11/
So in short, a lot of things in the redistricting sections of the Freedom to Vote that weren’t in the FTPA. But there also is one omission: Commissions. #fairmaps 12/
The FTPA would have required states to use independent commissions to draw congressional maps. But the Freedom to Vote Act leaves that choice up to states - while imposing uniform rules on how they do it and strengthening remedies. #fairmaps 13/
Meanwhile, in the Louisiana redistricting case, a bit of a dispute over whether Black plaintiffs will be allowed to submit an updated proposal for creating a second Black congressional district. (They submitted the one below in June 2022 before SCOTUS put the case on hold.)
The plaintiffs say that allowing them to submit a new proposal for a remedial map would the map to reflect data from recent elections and also give them a chance to try to address concerns raised by the state to the earlier proposed map.
They also propose that the state be given the chance to submit its own proposal for a remedial map after having declined to offer a proposal in June 2022. With the remedial hearing not until Oct 3-5, they say there is plenty of time for new maps to be proposed, discovery, etc.
In my time, I’ve seen some really brazen redistricting moves, but never something as breathtaking as what just happened in Alabama. Open defiance by a legislature of a federal court ruling that could not have been more clear about what it required.
To recap: SCOTUS ruled in June that the current Alabama congressional map (below) violates the Voting Rights Act because it divides heavily Black parts of the state up in a way that ensures Black voters can elect their preferred candidates in only 1 of 7 districts (District 7).
The ruling, authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, was a robust affirmation of the nearly 40 year old framework for deciding challenges to maps under Section 2 of VRA & upheld a unanimous trial court decision ordering Alabama to create a second Black congressional district.
There’s a little bit of confusion about what the map process of redrawing Alabama’s congressional map requires and how various laws interact. A thread 🧵 to break it down a bit. 1/
First, Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act does *not* require that Alabama necessarily draw a second majority-Black congressional district. Instead, what Alabama is required to do is remedy the vote dilution that court found in Black Belt region of the state. 2/
To be sure, a Black majority district is one way to remedy that vote dilution and as the district court found it would be pretty impossible in AL to remedy that vote dilution - given the high rates of racially polarized voting - without a district that is near Black majority. 3/
🚨BREAKING: The North Carolina Supreme Court has reversed its earlier rulings finding that partisan gerrymandering violates the state constitution. appellate.nccourts.org/opinions/?c=1&…
Decision is 5-2 with Justices Earls and Morgan dissenting.
The decision is bad on the merits. But it also is bad because casually chucking out precedent is *not* what courts are supposed to do. If the NC legislature disagreed that gerrymandering violates the state constitution, its remedy was to propose a constitutional amendment.
Well, the Harper v. Hall argument is over - and I have so many thoughts. But I’ll start with a couple of quotes from Justice Earls & Justice Morgan encapsulate how crazy the legislature’s pro-gerrymandering position is. 1/
First, from Justice Morgan in response to NC lawmakers’ contention that the NC Constitution doesn’t speak to fair maps: “Well, it does say elections shall be free - and free elections inherently contemplate fair elections.” 2/
And then from Justice Earls in response to the lawyer for NC lawmakers’ contention that the remedy for unfair maps is one for the people, not courts:
“But how can it be left up to the people when the maps pre-determine the results.” 3/
Redistricting & the fight for fair maps return to the fore Tuesday when the North Carolina Supreme Court takes up a request by GOP lawmakers to have the court throw out precedents holding that partisan gerrymandering violates the NC Constitution. A thread 🧵 1/
First, to set the table, North Carolina is one of eight states where since 2018 state courts have enforced limits on partisan gerrymandering in state law - striking down both Democratic-drawn & Republican-drawn maps. 2/
Indeed, ever since SCOTUS ruled in Rucho v. Common Cause that partisan gerrymandering claims were non-justiciable in federal court, there has been an explosion of cases under the broader, often much more explicit democratic guarantees in state constitutions. 3/