Redistricting Fights Fall on State Courts
Democrats and Republicans fighting over the decennial process of redrawing state political boundaries are increasingly turning to state courts, putting pressure on ordinarily overlooked state Supreme Court justices who will have a disproportionate new impact on the future of the U.S. House of Representatives.
The importance of those courts was on display Wednesday, when the Ohio Supreme Court ruled against Republican-drawn state legislative maps that would have effectively guaranteed GOP dominance of the legislature for at least four years. Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, a Republican, ruled that the maps violated provisions of a 2015 constitutional amendment that required Ohio’s new redistricting commission to avoid favoring one party or the other.
