Order to redraw NY voting districts threatens Republican control of House

ALBANY (CN) — A New York appeals court ordered the state’s redistricting commission on Thursday to redraw the election district for congressional races, potentially shifting as many as six Republican-held seats and giving Democrats a chance to tip the House left.

The 3-2 ruling from the state’s Appellate Division Third Judicial Department reverses a lower court opinion. Democrats are supporting the lawsuit, which seeks to toss out the 2022 district maps in New York under that allowed Republicans to flip four congressional seats.

How quickly the redraw begins, if it happens at all, is still uncertain: A spokesman for National Republican Congressional Committee pledged to seek an immediate review from the state’s highest court, the New York Court of Appeals.

“After failing to win at the ballot box last November, New York Democrats are attempting a blatant partisan power grab thinly disguised as a court case,” the spokesman Jack Pandol said in a statement.

If the Independent Redistricting Commission carries out the redraw, the political implications could be significant, as Republicans currently control the House of Representatives by a razor-thin majority after the midterm elections.

The maps that governed the 2022 elections were themselves the product of a redraw after Republicans argued in two cases — Harkenrider v. Hochul and Nichols v. Hochul — that the first map produced after the 2020 census had been gerrymandered to favor Democrats, who are in the majority in New York's Legislature.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who represents New York’s 8th Congressional District, noted in a statement Thursday that the emergency map put in place for the election "was drawn by an unelected, out-of-town Special Master appointed by an extreme right-wing judge, who himself was handpicked by partisan political operatives."

Democratic electors argued in the latest challenge that the Independent Redistricting Commission had a constitutional requirement to submit a second map for use until the next census.

If allowed to stand, the court-ordered map would remain in place for the next decade.

Presiding Justice Elizabeth Garry wrote for the court majority Thursday that the Democratic electors “have demonstrated a clear legal right to the relief sought.” The court ordered the commission to “commence its duties forthwith.”

“In light of the foregoing, petitioners This determination honors the constitutional enactments as the means of providing a robust, fair and equitable procedure for the determination of voting districts in New York,” Garry wrote. “The right to participate in the democratic process is the most essential right in our system of governance. The procedures governing the redistricting process, all too easily abused by those who would seek to minimize the voters' voice and entrench themselves in the seats of power, must be guarded as jealously as the right to vote itself; in granting this petition, we return the matter to its constitutional design.”

Aria Branch, an attorney who argued for the Democratic electors in a hearing last month, applauded the panel’s ruling.

“New Yorkers deserve the fair lines and fair process they voted for, and today’s decision is a huge step in the right direction,” she said in statement Thursday. “We are thrilled that the Court recognized the Independent Redistricting Commission’s constitutional duty to redraw New York’s congressional map. We will continue to advocate for the open, fair redistricting process that recognizes New York’s racial, ethnic, and geographic diversity.”

Jeffries echoed this sentiment. “It’s important that the Independent Redistricting Commission get to work expeditiously and present a map that fairly reflects the racial, ethnic, cultural, regional and socio-economic diversity of our great state," the congressman wrote.

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