NY DEMS WHINING OVER THEIR DISASTER

NEW York Democrats have been whining since the state Court of Appeals tossed their gerrymandered US House and state Senate maps on April 28, but they have only themselves to blame. While the Republicans who sued to stop the gerrymander rightly celebrate the outcome, the true victors are the people of New York.

New Yorkers of all political stripes voted overwhelmingly in 2014 to approve a constitutional amendment that dramatically reformed the redistricting process.

The voters handed control to an independent commission charged with crafting new legislative and House districts: Only after the Senate and Assembly had twice rejected proposals by the commission could the Legislature take over the process.

The amendment also explicitly barred partisan gerrymandering: Districts could neither be drawn to reduce political competition nor to benefit one candidate or party over another.

These provisions, inspired by former New York City mayor Ed Koch and the League of Women Voters, represented a radical departure from the insider-led, intensely political process of the past. ThenGov.

Andrew Cuomo also played a key role in prodding a reluctant Legislature to place the constitutional amendment on the ballot.

But Democratic leaders in Albany and Washington didn’t like the new system. Rather than follow the Constitution, the Legislature took over the process before the commission submitted a second plan.

While it is beyond doubt that the independent commission process broke down, many suspect that this was the scheme all along. Indeed, the Legislature initially refused to even fund the commission, only doing so after the Government Justice Center sued in March 2021 to require money be appropriated to get the commission up and running.

Then the Legislature put a new constitutional amendment on last year’s ballot, Proposition 1, which aimed to make it easier for the Legislature to circumvent the commission. And when the voters rejected Prop 1, the Legislature pulled another stunt, passing a law to allow it to control the process more easily.

In short, everything the Legislature did on redistricting aimed to weaken the 2014 amendment and place total control over the process in the hands of Democratic leaders.

The partisan maps they drew would have reduced GOP membership in the US House of Representatives from eight to four, with only three competitive districts. Their plan for the state Senate similarly decimated GOP membership there, guaranteeing little opposition to more spending, higher taxes, lax criminal-justice policies and other items on the progressive wish list.

Cynics, perhaps hardened by experience, said that the GOP lawsuit couldn’t succeed, that New York’s courts — particularly the appellate courts, their judges overwhelmingly appointed by Democratic governors — would never rule against the Legislature.

Wrong. Faced with the explicit language in the state Constitution, the courts issued a strong rebuke to the Legislature and Gov. Kathy Hochul, who signed the gerrymander into law. Chief Judge Janet DiFiore’s majority opinion was a landmark decision that future Legislatures will ignore at their peril.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the No. 4 House Democrat, attacked the courts and belittled the trial court judge as simply a GOP partisan from a county he said he never heard of before. He then played the race card, saying the courts and the nonpartisan expert who created the fair districting plans “would have made Jim Crow blush.”

Simply absurd. The plans create many competitive House and state Senate seats while protecting minority voting rights.

Jeffries and fellow Democrats attacking the outcome have only themselves to blame. Had Democratic politicians followed the state Constitution and not overreached with their illegal gerrymander, they’d have likely gained a modest partisan advantage.

Instead, they chose to ignore the clear will of the voters and the text of the state Constitution. That strategy, rejected by the courts, led to the outside expert crafting fair maps, and forced a second primary election on Aug. 23 for US House and state Senate seats.

Every kid on a ballfield knows what to call people who whine and complain when they lose: sore losers.

John J. Faso, the GOP candidate for governor in 2006, served in Congress and the state Assembly. He was an adviser to petitioners in the redistricting lawsuit.