For the second year in a row, New York’s highest court will be at the center of the political world as a Democratic-backed redistricting challenge could upend the battle for control of the U.S. House of Representatives in 2024.
An appeals court on Thursday sided with Democrats in an attempt to redraw congressional lines in New York, where there are several battleground seats.
“Clearly, the appeals judges were writing for the Court of Appeals, knowing that this case is headed one step up to the state’s highest court for final review,” Jeff said Wice, assistant professor and principal investigator at New York Law School. “Judges today anticipated what the Court of Appeal might be looking at.”
It’s a contrast to a year ago, when a Republican-backed lawsuit successfully challenged the lines drawn by the legislature for the state Senate and the US House. The process was thrown to a special master who drew lines that were immediately rebuked by Democrats.
Republicans won narrow control of the House last year as the party won or held a handful of key seats in New York.
But this time, the court is a little different. Newly installed Chief Justice Rowan Wilson sided with Democrats in last year’s redistricting fight. Wilson was confirmed as chief judge after Gov. Kathy Hochul’s initial pick for the position, Hector LaSalle, was rejected by the Democratic-led state Senate.
If Democrats are successful, an appointed commission will redraw congressional lines. If that committee stalls, the process is sent to the Legislature, where both chambers are controlled by Democratic supermajorities.
“The key is whether the map that comes out of this process, if there is one, will be one that conforms to the requirements of the state constitution,” Wice said.
Former Republican Rep. John Faso, now a state party official, is confident the state’s highest court will keep the existing lines in place.
“On the facts and on the constitution, our case is very strong,” Faso said in an interview on Thursday.
Democrats, he said, are trying to extinguish political competition in a deep blue state.
“They’re trying to eliminate a state redistricting plan that has the most competitive districts in the United States of America,” Faso said.
Redistricting is an increasingly important process with national implications. Critics have long criticized partisan gerrymandering that can calcify partisanship by creating heavily Democratic or heavily Republican districts.
“One of the problems with political polarization in our country is that there are people who get elected from red or blue districts, and they only care about their base,” he said.
New York’s current redistricting process is the result of a constitutional change approved by voters in a referendum more than a decade ago. Some Democratic lawmakers discussed the possibility of revisiting redistricting once again, but quietly dropped the discussion midway through the legislative session.
However, there is still time to begin the state’s cumbersome constitutional amendment process to change redistricting for the next round in 2032.
“You could expect the Legislature and the voters to revisit the whole process before the decade is out,” said Wice, the assistant professor at New York Law School, “and make sure that the setbacks of the last year don’t let it happen again.”
