US Supreme Court Decision a 'Roadmap' for a Ruling On Partisan Gerrymandering Case

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A unanimous US Supreme Court handed down a decision in Gill v. Whitford, a case challenging the extreme partisan gerrymandering of Wisconsin voting districts by the GOP legislature. The Court remanded the technical issue of “standing” back to the same three-judge panel that had ruled Wisconsin legislative districts unconstitutional. The Court did not rule on the merits, leaving the door open for a ruling that may still rein in computer-aided, hyper-partisan gerrymandering. Read the ruling here.

Paul Smith of the Campaign Legal Center argued the case before the Court on October 3, 2017. He explained the ruling at a press conference.

“The Court issued a unanimous decision saying that the plaintiffs did not yet prove they had standing to pursue the gerrymandering claim… saying essentially that our theory of statewide vote dilution does not work under a standing law that does not produce a sufficiently ‘concrete and particularized’ injury for each of the plaintiffs,” said Smith. The Court said “you have to look at the issue on a district by district basis.”

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