A ruling for North Carolina’s legislature also could affect redistricting lawsuits in states ranging from Republican-led Utah to Democratic-led New Mexico.
A decision in the North Carolina gerrymandering case could affect ongoing court battles in Kentucky, New Mexico and Utah.
North Carolina’s top Republican lawmakers contend they can’t. Rather, they assert that the U.S. Constitution gives power over federal elections only to state legislatures and Congress — an argument known as the “independent state legislature” theory. A broad embrace of the theory by the high court could upend hundreds of election laws across the U.S.
Republicans controlled more state capitols after the 2010 census and used redistricting to their advantage, prompting a flurry of lawsuits from Democrats. Those suits culminated in 2019, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in another North Carolina case that federal courts have no role in deciding partisan gerrymandering disputes. Even so, the majority opinion suggested that state courts still could hear such claims.
In 2019, a panel of North Carolina judges used similar reasoning to block U.S. House districts passed by the Republican-led General Assembly. They said the districts likely ran afoul of state constitutional provisions guaranteeing “free” elections, “equal protection of the laws” and the right to free speech and assembly. The legislature subsequently passed revised districts for the 2020 election, and the GOP’s congressional majority over Democrats shrunk from 10-3 to 8-5.
In Kentucky, Democrats have asked the state Supreme Court to overturn a lower court ruling that partisan gerrymandering is not prohibited by the state constitution. The lawsuit against the U.S. House districts enacted by the Republican-led Legislature cites the state constitution’s guarantee of “free and equal” elections.
It’s unclear whether the nation’s high court will take up the Ohio case. But a decision in favor of North Carolina’s GOP lawmakers could pave the way for Ohio’s Republican officials to ignore their own court’s directives.
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