Missouri asks Supreme Court to allow congressional map with extra GOP seat ahead of midterms

J. Scott Applewhite/AP

Missouri officials urged the Supreme Court on Friday to reinstate a congressional map that includes an additional seat for the Republican Party , the latest emergency case tied to President Donald Trump’s nationwide redistricting fight to reach the high court.

The emergency appeal comes a day after the state’s top court blocked that map for the November midterm election.

“A federal-election-administration disaster is unfolding in Missouri,” the state told the Supreme Court in an emergency appeal that warned of “unprecedented chaos” if the justices decline to intervene.

The state asked the Supreme Court to resolve the case by September 14, relying in part on a federal law that dictates the timing for mailing overseas and military ballots.

“Missouri cannot run a timely, lawful federal election absent a stay,” Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway, a Republican, told the Supreme Court. “This court has long recognized that last-minute judicial alterations can upend and inflict chaos on federal elections.”

The court ordered the plaintiffs who sued over the map to respond by midday Monday.

Missouri’s new map, which was enacted last year, was used in the state’s primary election last month. But the state’s highest court ruled Thursday evening that officials in Missouri wrongly dismissed a petition with more than 300,000 signatures to let the state’s voters decide on the map via a referendum before it took effect.

Photo Illustration by Alberto Mier/CNN

Tracking states’ unprecedented redistricting efforts

At Trump’s behest, GOP-led states have embarked on an unusual mid-decade redistricting to give Republicans an advantage in this year’s midterms. That has prompted some Democratic states to respond with their own redistricting in the hopes of offsetting that advantage.

Overall, Republicans have benefited most from that effort.

And the 6-3 conservative Supreme Court has played a significant role, potentially shaping the outcome of the midterms. The court’s landmark decision earlier this year gutting a significant part of the Voting Rights Act led to new redistricting in several Republican states in the South. Meanwhile, the court allowed Texas to use a Republican-friendly map and permitted California to use a map that benefits Democrats.

In May, the court rejected a request from Virginia officials to implement a congressional map that would have benefited Democrats.

The Missouri Supreme Court, on which five of seven judges were appointed by Republican governors, unanimously sided against the Republican-friendly map late Thursday.

In doing so, the judges explicitly rejected the state’s arguments that it was too late to change the map and criticized Secretary of State Denny Hoskins, a Republican, for dragging the process out.

“These arguments are particularly misplaced given the secretary’s delay created the confusion, expense, and practical difficulties of which he complains,” Judge Ginger Gooch wrote.

Opponents of the new map submitted their petition in December, but Hoskins waited until August 4, the last possible date, which happened to be the day of the state’s primary, to declare that, in his view, the state constitution’s right for voters to weigh in on legislation doesn’t apply to redistricting measures.

The court rejected that argument, and Gooch noted in her opinion that Hoskins could have made that determination as early as last year, which would’ve allowed the process to play out earlier. Trump slammed the state court ruling in a social media post on Thursday, saying that it had “ridiculously ruled in favor of changing the maps back to what they were a long time ago.”

The state’s map targets the 5th Congressional District, held by Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, by breaking up its Kansas City base and stretching it into rural and Republican-leaning parts of the state.

J. Scott Applewhite/美联社

密苏里州官员周五敦促最高法院恢复一份国会选区划分图，该图包含共和党的一个额外席位。这是与唐纳德·特朗普总统在全国范围内进行的选区重划斗争相关的最新紧急案件，该斗争最终诉至最高法院。

就在州最高法院阻止该地图用于11月中期选举的第二天，这项紧急上诉被提出。

“一场联邦选举管理灾难正在密苏里州上演，”该州在向最高法院提交的紧急上诉中表示，并警告说，如果大法官们拒绝干预，将会出现“前所未有的混乱”。

该州要求最高法院在 9 月 14 日前解决此案，部分依据的是一项联邦法律，该法律规定了向海外和军人邮寄选票的时间。

“如果没有暂缓执行令，密苏里州就无法及时、合法地举行联邦选举，”密苏里州共和党籍总检察长凯瑟琳·哈纳威告诉最高法院。“本法院长期以来都认识到，最后一刻的司法变更可能会颠覆联邦选举，并造成混乱。”

法院命令就地图问题提起诉讼的原告在周一中午前作出回应。

密苏里州去年颁布的新选区划分图已在上个月的州初选中使用。但该州最高法院周四晚间裁定，密苏里州官员错误地驳回了一份拥有超过30万个签名的请愿书，该请愿书要求在新选区划分图生效前，让该州选民通过全民公投来决定其最终归属。

图片由 Alberto Mier/CNN 提供

追踪各州前所未有的选区重划工作

在特朗普的授意下，共和党执政的各州启动了一项不同寻常的中期选区重划计划，旨在为共和党在今年的中期选举中赢得优势。这促使一些民主党执政的州也开始进行选区重划，希望以此抵消共和党的优势。

总体而言，共和党人从这项努力中获益最多。

保守派占多数的最高法院（6比3）发挥了重要作用，可能左右了中期选举的结果。今年早些时候，最高法院的一项里程碑式裁决削弱了《投票权法案》的重要部分，导致南部几个共和党州重新划分选区。与此同时，最高法院允许德克萨斯州使用有利于共和党的选区地图，并允许加利福尼亚州使用有利于民主党的选区地图。

5 月，法院驳回了弗吉尼亚州官员提出的实施有利于民主党的国会选区划分方案的请求。

密苏里州最高法院（七名法官中有五名由共和党州长任命）于周四晚些时候一致反对有利于共和党的选区划分方案。

法官们在裁决中明确驳回了该州关于更改地图为时已晚的论点，并批评了共和党籍的州务卿丹尼·霍斯金斯拖延这一进程。

“鉴于秘书的拖延造成了他所抱怨的混乱、费用和实际困难，这些论点尤其站不住脚，”金杰·古奇法官写道。

新地图的反对者在 12 月提交了请愿书，但霍斯金斯等到 8 月 4 日——最后一个可能的日期，恰好是该州初选日——才宣布，在他看来，州宪法赋予选民对立法发表意见的权利不适用于重新划分选区的措施。

法院驳回了这一论点，古奇法官在她的意见书中指出，霍斯金斯法官早在去年就可以做出这一决定，这样就能让整个程序更早完成。特朗普周四在社交媒体上发文抨击州法院的裁决，称其“荒谬地支持将地图改回很久以前的样子”。

该州的选区划分图以民主党众议员伊曼纽尔·克利弗所在的第五国会选区为目标，通过分割其在堪萨斯城的票仓，并将其扩展到该州的农村和共和党倾向地区。