N.Y.’s redistricting long fight is over
Finally. After a three year long fight, the New York State Legislature has enacted a new map for the state’s 26 congressional districts. This action ends the redistricting process after extensive legal battles which culminated in two decisions by New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals.
Threatened with yet another court fight, the Democrats’ supermajorities in the state Legislature, adopted a final map which does not materially differ from the map drawn by a neutral, court-appointed expert in 2022.
The state Constitution’s redistricting amendment adopted by voters in 2014 was intended to greatly reduce the Legislature’s power over redistricting by establishing the bipartisan Independent Redistricting Commission (IRC) with primary responsibility for drafting legislative and congressional maps. That amendment also contained the nation’s strongest state prohibition against partisan gerrymandering.
State Democrats had other ideas and sought at every turn to undermine the 2014 amendment. Initially, Democrats refused to even fund the IRC, and it took a lawsuit filed by the Government Justice Center in 2021 to get the IRC up and running.
That same year Democrats pushed a constitutional amendment under the guise of further “reforming” the redistricting process. That amendment gutted the bipartisan composition of the IRC and would have allowed the Legislature to easily reclaim power from the IRC.
Fortunately, voters overwhelmingly rejected the amendment. Not chastened by the amendment’s defeat, Democrats then arrogantly enacted a statute giving them the power to override the IRC identical to that contained in the rejected amendment.
The Legislature used this statutory process to pass an extreme gerrymander on Feb. 2, 2022. That plan was labeled as a “master class” in gerrymandering by the liberal Brennan Center. By stuffing Republican voters into just four congressional districts, Democrats were favored to win 22 of the 26 U.S. House seats.
GOP plaintiffs sued within an hour of Gov. Hochul signing the plan into law. An expert retained by plaintiffs proved that the Legislature’s plan was more partisan than any of 10,000 computer simulated plans. The judge, hearing the lawsuit in Harkenrider vs. Hochul, ruled that the plan violated both the Constitution’s prohibition against partisan gerrymandering and its strict procedure.
Ultimately, the Court of Appeals agreed, ruling the plan and the statute allowing the Legislature to supplant the IRC contrary to the Constitution. They said the only remedy was to retain a special master to draft a new congressional map.
The special master’s plan resulted in nine competitive districts, more than any other state. With fair districts and a tight gubernatorial race in 2022, the GOP won eleven congressional seats — seven more than intended by the gerrymander — playing a critical role in flipping the House of Representatives to a Republican majority.
Caught red-handed violating the Constitution, Democrats were not embarrassed. Instead, they brought a new lawsuit, Hoffman vs. IRC, contending that the new map was only in place for the 2022 election and asking the court to order the IRC to send yet another plan to the Legislature.
Meanwhile, the chief judge of the Court of Appeals who had authored the Harkenrider decision resigned under pressure, setting in motion a complex political game in which Democrats defeated Hochul’s initial nominee for chief judge by falsely representing his judicial record and forced her to nominate Judge Rowan Wilson to the post. Wilson had dissented from the Harkenrider case in 2022, and pundits speculated he was chosen to do the Democrats’ bidding in Hoffman.
Last December, Chief Judge Wilson ruled in a 4-3 decision for the Democrats and ordered a new map drawn by the IRC. This ruling raised hopes among national Democrats that the Legislature could adopt yet another gerrymander.
However, the IRC approved — on a strong bipartisan vote of 9-1 — a congressional map that hardly varied from the special master plan. When the Democrats in the Legislature then rejected that IRC consensus, the D.C. Democrats thought that Albany would put in place a new gerrymander. Yet their hopes were dashed when, under the threat of renewed litigation, the Legislature adopted a final map only slightly different from the 2022 map drafted by the neutral special master.
Democrats corrupted our courts and displayed a quenchless thirst for more power. Was all this chaos worth it?
The redistricting saga is yet another example of how one-party rule is wrecking our state. Lenient criminal laws, excessive spending and taxes, sanctuary cities, and irrational energy policies all conspire to drive productive citizens and businesses from our state. It is time to reverse course.
Faso served in the U.S. Congress from 2017-2019 and is a former Republican leader of the state Assembly. He was an advisor to Republicans in the redistricting cases.