Soon after Justice Kavanaugh declined to stay a Missouri Supreme Court ruling that ordered the state to use its 2022 congressional map, a federal district court ordered the state to use its 2025 gerrymandered map. (Opponents of the 2025 gerrymandered map filed an emergency motion for a stay in the Eighth Circuit. No word yet from that court.) In response, the secretary of state announced that the state would comply with the federal district court and use its 2025 gerrymandered map. (The deadline for finalizing the ballot was yesterday.) And in response to that, the Missouri Supreme Court ordered the secretary of state to appear tomorrow for a contempt hearing.
The federal district court ruling seems in tension, at least, with Justice Kavanaugh’s decision not to stay the Missouri Supreme Court ruling. If the Eighth Circuit and, ultimate, the Supreme Court think so, too, they’ll probably stay this district court ruling and reinstate the 2022 map for the general election.
The district court held that the Missouri Supreme Court’s order to use the state’s earlier 2022 congressional map violated Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution and the Equal Protection Clause.
As to Article I, Section 2, which says that the people elect House members every two years, the court held that primary elections are an integral part of general elections. And because the state used its 2025 gerrymandered map in the primary election, it had to use that same map in the general election. The court said it didn’t matter that the state’s use of the 2025 map in the primary election was illegal (as the state supreme court held), because voters voted in the primaries based on the 2025 map and “based on the parameters set by Missouri’s highest election authority, the Secretary of State.” (Pause for a moment to consider the implications of that holding. It would apparently allow the secretary of state to use any map they wanted in the primary (or potentially to take any other election-related measure), irrespective of its legality, and then force that map (or even that measure) on the electorate in the general.)
As to equal protection, the court held that the state supreme court order would classify voters into two groups–“those who happen to stay in their [2025-map] congressional district, and those who do not.” The court held that “[s]witching maps now would deprive many Missourians of their equal vote in the primaries . . . .” (This theory could also have sweeping implications.)
We expect the Eighth Circuit and Supreme Court to move quickly, though no word yet.
Leave a Reply