Trump lawyers urge Supreme Court to block California’s new election map while upholding Texas’
WASHINGTON— Trump administration lawyers have joined California Republicans in urging the Supreme Court to block California’s new electoral map on the grounds that a district in the San Joaquin Valley favors Latinos.
Two months ago, Trump’s lawyers had urged the court to approve a new Republican-friendly electoral map in Texas, arguing that it was a partisan douchebag, not a map based on race.
“Plaintiffs alleging race-gerrymander have a heavy burden to show that race was the dominant factor motivating how the map was drawn,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer said at the time.
The Supreme Court agreed by a 6-3 vote and overturned a judge’s decision blocking the Texas map, which was drawn to give Republicans five more seats in the House of Representatives.
Voting rights advocates sued, noting that Gov. Greg Abbott said the goal was to eliminate four “coalition districts” of Black and Latino voters and elected Democrats.
In sum, the justices said they assumed state officials acted in “good faith” when drawing maps of congressional districts.
“The impetus for adopting the Texas map (like the map later adopted in California) partisan advantage pure and simple” wrote Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.
The judges also said it was too late in the election year calendar to realign districts.
Undeterred, Trump’s lawyers are now eyeing almost the exact opposite view to bolster the GOP’s attack on the California map approved by voters in November.
“California’s recent redistricting was tainted by something Unconstitutional racist gerrymander,” Sauer wrote.
He noted past comments by mapmaker appointee Paul Mitchell, who said he hoped Latino areas in the Central Valley could be “empowered to be most effective.”
Trump’s lawyer said the 13th District in Merced County has a strange-looking “northern plume” that brings Democratic voters near Stockton.
“California’s motivation for adopting the Prop. 50 map as a whole was undoubtedly to counter Texas’ political idiot,” Sauer said. “But this overarching political goal is not a license for racial gerrymandering at the district level.”
He recommended the justices declare the new California map unconstitutional and demand that the state revert to the old map.
The political impact of such a decision is obvious. This would likely cost Democrats five seats in the House of Representatives.
Justice Elena Kagan, who is overseeing the objections from the West Coast, asked for a response from California by Thursday. This suggests the justices could act as soon as the first week of February over the GOP objection.
Election law experts are skeptical of the Republican claims in the California case.
“I don’t think Republicans can win here.” UCLA law professor Rick Hasen wrote on the Election Law Blog.
He said the legal challenge “came too late,” that the proposed solution was too broad and ignored the fact that California voters were focused on partisanship, not race. What matters is their intention, he said.
Hasen also added: “There are images. It would be a terrible angle for the Court… to allow Texas’ Republican gerrymander to move forward and halt California’s, especially if it’s a party-line vote. That might be too much even for this Court.”
There is also an important legal difference in how the appeal reaches the court.
A three-judge panel in Texas heard the evidence, wrote a 160-page opinion, and ruled against the state in a 2-1 decision.
In the California case, by contrast, a three-judge panel heard the evidence and rejected the racial gerrymandering claim in a 2-1 decision.
In December, Kagan dissented from the Texas case, arguing that the court should be reluctant to reverse the factual findings of the three justices who heard the case.
Two justices in the majority said they saw no evidence of a racist gerrymander.
“We find that the evidence of any racial motivations leading to redistricting is extremely weak, but the evidence of partisan motivations is very strong,” U.S. District Judges Josephine Staton and Wesley Hsu wrote.
