A panel of three federal judges ruled on Monday that congressional districts in North Carolina are unconstitutionally gerrymandered in favor of Republicans and said they may have to be redrawn prior to the upcoming midterm elections.
In 2016, a federal court struck down the congressional map drawn by North Carolina lawmakers in 2011, calling it a racial gerrymander. This prompted legislators to redraw an essentially identical map, declaring that the parameters were set for explicitly political, not racial, reasons.
The Supreme Court then ordered the special panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit to reexamine the constitutionality of North Carolina’s congressional map, applying a new precedent established in the high court’s June ruling in a Wisconsin gerrymandering case.
Writing for the unanimous three-judge majority, Judge James A. Wynn Jr. said the precedent established under Wisconsin’s Gill v. Whitford supported the court’s previous ruling that the North Carolina congressional map has been distorted to serve partisan interests.
“We continue to lament that North Carolina voters now have been deprived of a constitutional congressional districting plan — and, therefore, constitutional representation in Congress — for six years and three election cycles,” Wynn wrote. “To the extent allowing the General Assembly another opportunity to draw a remedial plan would further delay electing representatives under a constitutional districting plan, that delay weighs heavily against giving the General Assembly another such opportunity.”
Wynn offered a number of potential solutions to avoid further depriving North Carolina voters of “constitutional representation” in the upcoming November elections: appointing a special master to redraw the congressional districts, using the November election as the primary before holding the general election in the following months, or simply holding an open general election while foregoing the party primary process entirely.
While the Supreme Court typically makes every effort to avoid hearing cases with explicitly political implications in close proximity to an election, North Carolina Republicans are expected to petition the high court to hear the case.
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