GOP asks Supreme Court to block new Pennsylvania congressional maps

[riversedge]

Source: CNN



By Ariane de Vogue and Eric Bradner, CNN

Updated 6:47 PM ET, Tue February 27, 2018

Washington (CNN)Pennsylvania Republicans are asking the US Supreme Court to block new congressional maps that would tilt several key races in Democrats' favor from being used in this year's midterm elections.

The GOP leaders of the state House and Senate asked Tuesday for an emergency stay blocking the implementation of the maps, which were unveiled this month by the state Supreme Court after it ruled that the previous maps had been gerrymandered in violation of Pennsylvania's Constitution.

It's a final effort to stop major changes to a congressional delegation that now comprises 13 Republican-held seats and five Democrats.
Lawyers for House Speaker Mike Turzai and Senate President Pro Tempore Joseph Scarnati argue that the state's high court overstepped its authority in setting a deadline for lawmakers to draw new maps -- and then, when the GOP-led Legislature missed that deadline, producing new maps on its own.

In court papers, their lawyers said the state court's move "blatantly usurps the power of the Pennsylvania General Assembly and inflicts confusion on the Commonwealth's upcoming congressional elections." .......................

Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2018/02/27/politics/pennylvania-supreme-court-redistricting/index.html

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Rupugs should use their own money and then they would not be so eager to rush to the courts!

[Maven]

1. "Wah! We rigged the game fair and square!"

"Now we have to win more votes! Wah!"

- GOP

[Fred Sanders]

4. Trying to skip over all the courts below to go direct to SCOTUS every second day must be annoying.

[magicarpet]

2. They rigged the USSC with Gorsuch....

.... Their back up plan has to work. They can't win a free and fair election unless their thumb and foot is unfairly on the scale.

[rpannier]

9. They may be in trouble on this

Alito refused them a hearing before. That usually means they can't cobble together four votes for the plaintiff. Which means 5 votes is highly unlikely

[pangaia]

3. "emergency stay "

I'll say it's an emergency. They just might lose seats.

[SergeStorms]

5. Hey, there are five Democratic seats up for grabs now too......

it's not all stacked in the Demnocrat's favor. The GOP can win those seats just as well as a Democrat might. Right?

The Republicans know that if they don't cheat, they don't gain no seat!

The Supreme Whores won't hear this. They've already said it's a State's rights issue and won't interfere, MUCH to my surprise! I'd hate to start thinking some of those right-wing Justices have scruples!

[TomSlick]

6. This might be an important case. It shouldn't be but it might be.

SCOTUS really has no reason to get involved in this state court decision. If SCOTUS takes up the case, that will mean it did not learn the lesson from Bush v. Gore about the cost to be paid to the Court's credibility. If SCOTUS overturns the State Supreme Court, it will mean that there is no hesitation to ignore precedent to advance short-term political objectives.

I hope the case turns out to be as unimportant as it deserves.

[CousinIT]

7. Well, the NC legislature went whining to Gorsuch & the USSC and they patted their little heads:

"there, there, poor little Republicans babies. You don't have to re-draw your unconstitutional gerrymandered-to-hell-and-back maps just because those mean old Democrats sued you and you lost."

SO, NC's unconstitutional gerrymandered-to-hell-and-back maps remain -- until Gorsuch and the USSC declare such gerrymandering legal and constitutional across the land, which I'm certain they will do.

[BigmanPigman]

8. There is no justice in this country and there hasn't been.

Slowly but surely the GOP has been breaking and cheating their way through every law for 20 years.

[atreides1]

11. The difference

Both states have their own State Constitutions...in PA what the Republicans did, violated the state Constitution...in NC not so much!

[CRK7376]

12. Living the dream everyday in NC

....sucks to be us in NC. Supremes handed GOP a reprieve, hopefully temporarily....I hate want GOP has done to my state and our nation.

[BumRushDaShow]

10. "when the GOP-led Legislature missed that deadline, producing new maps on its own."

CNN missed this fact - the leaders of our GOP-lead legislature, SUBMITTED a map by the deadline, but without the review/approval of the entire legislature because they refused to call them into session, and also refused to even submit a "shell bill" that could have been written to include that submitted map, so they killed their own argument by doing that.

The map that Turzai & Scarnati submitted to the court WAS reviewed by the Governor, despite not really having followed the court's submission process orders, and it was REJECTED by the Governor. All parties to the suit were then invited to submit additional maps to the court, which was done, and the court reviewed and eventually created a map that mostly reflected what had been submitted by all the parties.