Missouri Ag Asks The Supreme Court To Stop Map Ruling That Would Likely Stop Republicans From Gaining A Seat

Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway on Friday night asked the U.S. Supreme Court for an emergency stay of a Missouri high court ruling that found the state cannot use new, heavily gerrymandered districts in the November election.

“A federal-election-administration disaster is unfolding in Missouri,” Hanaway wrote in a filing for Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who handles appeals for cases filed in the Show-Me State.

Hanaway’s plea came after the Missouri Supreme Court on Thursday put the brakes on a congressional map drawn by Republicans last year with the backing of President Donald Trump and ordered a Democrat-organized referendum on the GOP’s map proposal, which would have likely given Republicans a 7-1 advantage by eliminating the Kansas City district held by longtime Democratic Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.), be put to a vote this fall.

The court ruled that the November elections must proceed in accordance with the map Missouri used in 2022, which still saw Republicans favored in six of the state’s eight districts.

But Missourians already voted in primary elections last month under the new district lines. Hanaway said state leadership was “genuinely unsure whether it can switch its governing congressional map in time to run a timely federal election.”

“No court in American history has ever given such an extraordinary remedy, which inflicts unprecedented chaos on Missouri,” she wrote. “Looking backwards, the order renders a completed federal Primary Election utterly pointless—disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of voters who will now be moved into new districts and forced to vote for candidates they had no role in selecting.”

Kavanaugh asked for the lawyers who’d challenged Missouri’s new maps to respond by noon on Monday. Still, federal courts generally defer to state counterparts in their interpretations of state law.

The Missouri Supreme Court sharply criticized Secretary of State Denny Hoskins in its ruling, repeatedly saying his assertions were made “with no supporting authority.” Hoskins in August blocked the Democrat-backed referendum on the new congressional districts from the November ballot, saying questions on redistricting were ineligible for public consideration. In the unanimous Thursday ruling, the court reversed his decision. Missouri voters will now decide on the new map proposal in the coming months.

The party has gained a major lead on Democrats in map redraws nationwide ahead of the midterm elections, boosted by an April Supreme Court ruling that gutted the Voting Rights Act.

But Thursday marked a relative low point for Republicans in their mid-decade redistricting push. In addition to the Missouri ruling, the high court in Maryland also handed down a ruling that day allowing the state legislature to proceed with a November ballot question that could give Democrats an 8-0 redistricting advantage in the state as soon as 2028.

Josh Gerstein contributed to this report.