Democrats Want State Supreme Court to Create New Voting Maps by March 2024

Tuesday, October 17th, 2023 -- 2:01 PM

(AP) Democratic voters in Wisconsin hoping to undo Republican-drawn legislative district maps told the liberal-controlled state Supreme Court on Monday that it should create new maps by March, forcing every lawmaker to stand for election under redrawn lines in 2024.

“The current maps are unsalvageable,” attorneys for the voters argued. But Republicans who control the Legislature countered that Democrats were exercising “raw political power” and trying to take advantage of the new liberal majority on the court to overturn its 2021 ruling that adopted the current maps.

“A change in this Court’s membership cannot justify overturning that precedent,” attorneys for the Legislature wrote in legal filings. Oral arguments are set for Nov. 21. Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has intervened on the side of voters asking the court to toss out the Republican-drawn maps, widely seen as among the most gerrymandered in the country, and draw new ones ahead of the 2024 election.

Republicans have been in majority control of both the Wisconsin Senate and Assembly since 2011. During that time, they have enacted a wide range of conservative priorities. They have all but eliminated collective bargaining for public workers, and since 2019 they’ve been a block on Evers’ agenda.

Republicans are also just two seats short of a supermajority that would allow them to overturn Evers’ vetoes. New maps favoring Democrats would weaken Republicans’ grip on legislative power, which they have also used in the Senate to fire Evers appointees and to threaten impeachment of Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz and the state’s elections leader.

Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos continues to threaten impeachment of Protasiewicz after she refused to step down from the redistricting case. Impeachment has drawn bipartisan opposition and two former conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court justices, asked by Vos to investigate the possibility, told him it was not warranted.

Vos last week suggested he would pursue impeachment if Protasiewicz votes to throw out the Republican maps.

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