Election Law

‘Gorsuch Court’ Has Texas’s Back When It Comes To Voter Suppression

I don't know what Gill v. Whitford is going to do, but it's going to do all of it.

By Elie Mystal on September 13, 2017 2:46 pm

Neil “Still Not Merrick Garland” Gorsuch provided the crucial fifth vote in a contentious stay granted by the Supreme Court last night. A court order requiring Texas to redraw a couple of its Congressional districts was indefinitely put on hold by the high court.

Arguably, we’ll all get more guidance on how states are allowed to gerrymander when the Court hears Gill v. Whitford this fall. We are set up for a gerrymandering showdown and I think we’re all looking forward to Anthony Kennedy explaining what democracy means for the rest of us.

But for those who oppose voter suppression, the stay was a serious blow. The Texas districts at issue were drawn, explicitly, to decrease the power of the franchise in minority communities. The maps were rejected by the lower courts. Stepping in to grant a stay is red flag that the Supreme Court, back at full strength now with Neil Gorsuch, is ready to allow the states to draw lines in whatever way they see fit.

Without Gorsuch, the Court doesn’t have the votes to allow Texas to be Texas. With Gorsuch, the right wing of the Court is empowered to order the lines drawn in whatever way they see fit.

We know that this was a controversial opinion, not just because the ruling was 5-4, but because the justices in the minority went out of their way to object. Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan all noted that they would have denied the stay, which is something that we all kind of know, but they decided to make sure to tell us.

I’d strap in for Gill v. Whitford. Whatever the decision is, it’s going to lead to a a few new hastily drawn maps to try to get them in under the wire for 2018. And all the new maps drawn after the 2020 Census will reflect the Court’s opinion in this case.

Justices stay lower-court rulings striking down Texas redistricting maps, ordering new ones [SCOTUSBlog]

Elie Mystal is an editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at [email protected]. He will resist.