NPR: North Carolina Gerrymandering Trial Could Serve As Blueprint For Other States

Weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that federal courts can’t intervene in cases where state lawmakers have aggressively drawn political boundariesto benefit one political party over another, a new front in the nation’s redistricting battles opens Monday in a North Carolina courtroom.

The case has the potential to significantly alter how political maps are drawn in North Carolina and could serve as a blueprint for legal challenges in other states. Or, it could result in the latest affirmation of partisan gerrymandering — a tradition in American politics that stretches back more than two centuries. …

If the voting rights groups that have challenged North Carolina’s state legislative districts succeed, the maps could be ordered redrawn in time for the 2020 election in a state that is closely divided politically. That would give Democrats a better chance of winning at least one of the legislature’s two chambers and put them in a position to have a say in the redistricting process that begins in 2021.

“We have forever had a flawed process that preordains so many of our congressional and legislative elections to the party,” asserted Bob Phillips of Common Cause North Carolina, whose group filed the lawsuit. “I believe what’s at stake is the beginning of the end of that.”

Common Cause’s challenge contends the legislative maps were drawn to maximize the power of the GOP and violate the state constitution’s clauses guaranteeing the right to a free election, freedom of assembly and equal protection.

“And what we say is that when mapmakers are putting districts together solely primarily based on how people vote, is that’s a violation of all three,” Phillips said.

He added that this challenge is similar to a partisan redistricting case from Pennsylvania in 2016, when congressional maps were ultimately struck down by the state Supreme Court. Those maps, also drawn by a GOP-controlled legislature, gave Republicans a 12-6 edge in the state’s congressional delegation. Under the new maps used in 2018, the delegation was evenly split. …

The trial will feature records from an influential Republican redistricting consultant who helped draft many of North Carolina’s maps. Thomas Hofeller passed away in 2018, and his estranged daughter received many of his computer files and turned them over to Common Cause. The state court ruled Friday some of those files are admissible as evidence in the trial.