The New York state Court of Appeals threw out state Senate and congressional maps Wednesday and is requiring the state Supreme Court, with the assistance of the special master, to adopt constitutional maps. 

In addition to holding that the maps were unconstitutional because they were adopted in violation of the prescribed Independent Redistricting Commission procedure, the court held that the congressional map was unconstitutional as drawn with impermissible partisan purpose — giving weight to the constitutional provision added in 2014 that provides: “[d]istricts shall not be drawn to discourage competition or for the purpose of favoring or disfavoring incumbents or other particular candidates or political parties."

Michael Li, senior counsel for the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program, told Capital Tonight that the Court of Appeals ruling is important because it shows that voters are turning to state courts for relief from gerrymandering.

“It’s one of a series of state court rulings that have struck down both Democratic and Republican gerrymanders,” Li said. “Republican maps in Kansas, North Carolina and Ohio have been struck down, and then Democratic maps in Maryland and now New York have been struck down.”

It also shows that the reforms adopted by New Yorker voters in 2014 worked.

“The courts, in both procedure and substance, gave the 2014 amendment a lot of teeth,” Li said. 

This is “all brand new to New York," according to Li, so there is no precedent for what lawmakers or courts will do from this point forward.

This will be the second decade in a row that courts will end up drawing New York state’s maps. The Legislature deadlocked over the maps drawn after the 2010 Census. This time, the courts found that some of the legislatively drawn maps were gerrymandered.

Here's what Li also had to say.

Q: The new congressional and state Senate maps were thrown out, but not state Assembly maps. Are the new Assembly maps now law?

A: Yes.

Q: Does this have an effect on the gubernatorial or any of the statewide races?

A: I think that remains to be seen.  Right now, New York has a June 28 primary. You can no longer have congressional and state Senate primaries in June. The Court of Appeals recognizes that the primary would have to move to August. The question right now is whether the state is going to want to have two primaries, a bifurcated primary, one for governor in June and one for Congress and state Senate in August, or whether it’s going to want to move everything to August. That’s something that will be worked out over the next few days with the court, or perhaps the Legislature itself will take action.”

Q: Let’s say they move all the primary elections to August, does everybody have to re-petition?

A: That’s a great question. The Court of Appeals, in its opinion, said it was confident that the Board of Elections and the other stakeholders would be able to work out a schedule and figure all of this out. But there are a lot of pieces, as you point out, that go into this, and a lot of questions that I don’t think were really on the mind of the Court of Appeals. The stakeholders are going to have to get together and figure this out over the next few days. The court in Steuben County likely will also want to know what’s going on and may get involved itself.

Q: What do we know about Dr. Jonathan Cervas, the special master from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh who has been tapped to draw the new maps?

A: He’s a very well-respected academic who’s been involved in redistricting and who I think is very well-positioned to draw fair maps. The next process will be on May 6. [On that date] he’s supposed to have a hearing where all parties, including members of the Legislature, can argue about maps; people can submit maps to the special master, Dr. Cervas, and then he’s supposed to produce a proposed map by May 16 and then a final map by May 24. Then the [New York state Supreme Court] will sign off on that map.”

Q: So the Legislature has nothing more to do with the maps?

A: They can certainly submit maps. The majority could submit maps. Individual members of the Legislature could submit maps and argue to Dr. Cervas that they need to adopt their map, or they could look at his map say 'hey you need to change it here or there because you’re not keeping enough communities together' or things like that. But they are in the same position as anybody else who wants to submit a map. They are just a party of interest and he will take all of that into account.”

Q: Let’s say all the primary elections are moved to August, does that mean that someone running for governor would have more time to petition for signatures?

A: That is a great question. There is a lot that has to be sorted out, including whether you’re going to move everything or just the congressional and Senate races to August. All of it has to be sorted out.”