While milquetoast Republicans experience a collective tummy ache over the “fairness” of mid-decade redistricting, Democrats nationally are feasting on power-grabbing gerrymanders.
The latest outflanking comes — not surprisingly — from Wisconsin’s liberal-controlled Supreme Court.
‘Forum Shopping’
Just before the Thanksgiving holiday, the Badger State’s court of last resort ordered the creation of judicial panels to hear two lawsuits seeking to undo Wisconsin’s existing congressional maps, in which six of eight House seats are held by Republicans. Interestingly, the district lines were drawn by a committee whose members were appointed by Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, a far-left Democrat. The Evers maps benefitted Democrats, but didn’t go far enough for a Democratic Party salivating over a potential congressional power grab with the help of the liberal-led Supreme Court.
In a move oozing with partisanship, the court’s liberal justices selected some of the more far-left lower court judges in the state to serve on the two panels.
Justice Annette Kingsland Ziegler, one of three conservatives on the seven-member court, argued that the majority’s orders disregard the U.S. and Wisconsin constitutions and ignore fundamental legal principles.
“The majority not only undermines our constitutional authority and circumvents established redistricting precedent but also, again, usurps the legislature’s constitutional power,” Ziegler chided. “In allowing this litigation to proceed, the majority abdicates its constitutional superintending authority to Wisconsin’s circuit courts.”
The Republican-controlled state legislature and Wisconsin’s six GOP congressmen argue that the lawsuits confuse political representation concepts. But the Supreme Court’s majority said the argument is merely a matter of semantics, that “apportionment” and “redistricting” are used interchangeably in drawing up — or in this case, redrawing — political boundaries. And the law, the majority assert, requires the court “appoint a panel consisting of 3 circuit court judges to hear” a redistricting lawsuit.
Conservative Justice Brian Hagedorn, who has at times sided with the liberals on the court, takes no issue with the creation of the panels. In his dissenting opinion, however, Hagedorn disagrees with the process. He argued the law is “transparently designed to prevent forum shopping in disputes over where congressional lines should be drawn.” But that’s exactly what the majority did.
“Given the nature of this case and the statute’s implicit call for geographic diversity and neutrality, a randomly-selected panel and venue would be a better way to fulfill the statutory mandate,” the justice wrote. “Instead, my colleagues have chosen to keep this case in Dane County and leave the originally assigned Dane County judge on the panel.” Dane County’s circuit court, located in state capital and far-left enclave Madison, is one the more left-leaning courts in the country.
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