The Supreme Court of Ohio ruled Tuesday that the state’s GOP-backed congressional map is unconstitutional and ordered a new one crafted for the 2024 elections within 30 days.
With less than four months until the midterm elections, the current map, which was used for the primary elections, will remain in effect for the midterm elections, granting Republicans a temporary apportionment advantage.
OHIO SUPREME COURT REFUSES CONGRESSIONAL REDISTRICTING CASE UNTIL AFTER PRIMARY
“We hold that the March 2 plan unduly favors the Republican Party and disfavors the Democratic Party in violation of Article XIX, Section 1(C)(3)(a). We order the General Assembly to pass a new congressional-district plan that complies with the Ohio Constitution,” the court wrote in the 4-3 opinion.
After months of rebuffing Ohio Republicans’ congressional apportionment plans, the state’s high court announced in late March it would not take up a case involving the congressional map until after the May 3 congressional primary elections. This came despite the latest apportionment iteration in the state hewing closely to a prior map the court had stricken.
The contours of Ohio’s map are expected to give the GOP an edge in 10 districts, with two favoring Democrats and three remaining competitive, according to Dave Wasserman, a national elections analyst for the Cook Political Report. This means Republicans could boost their 12-4 congressional seat count to 13-2. The state lost a seat during the census.
Although Republicans hold a 4-3 majority of appointees on Ohio’s Supreme Court, Republican Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor has proven to be a maverick on redistricting, routinely bucking her party by joining her liberal colleagues. She was the swing vote on Tuesday and has argued the slew of GOP-backed maps challenged in court over recent months flouted the state constitution.
“The statewide proportion of districts whose voters, based on statewide state and federal partisan general election results during the last ten years, favor each political party shall correspond closely to the statewide preferences of the voters of Ohio,” the state constitution says.
The court has also regularly nixed maps for state elections, citing similar concerns about proportionality and partisan advantages.
In May, the court canned a fifth set of state legislative maps. Unlike Ohio’s congressional races, the line-drawing skirmish forces the state to delay its primary date for state legislative races due to an impasse over the maps. Eventually, a panel of federal judges intervened and enacted a map proposed by Republicans rejected by the state Supreme Court, stressing the importance of having a map in place for the midterm elections. The primaries for those outstanding elections will take place on Aug. 2.
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O’Connor is expected to retire after the midterm cycle due to age limits. The departure has provoked speculation that the dynamic of the courts could shift in favor of the GOP, allowing it to enact its preferred maps in the future.
All states have legally binding maps in effect ahead of the midterm elections, according to FiveThirtyEight‘s redistricting tracker. About a dozen states remain in litigation over their maps.
