Court Clarifies Order To Redistricting Board

The state Supreme Court gave the state Redistricting Board the clarification it was looking for last week. It said its order requiring the Board to draft a map of legislative districts based on the criteria of the state Constitution should involve all districts, not the few in which there is a federal concern to preserve Native voting power. There was no immediate response from Board chairman John Torgerson, who has said in the past that the Board intends to do nothing until the U.S. Supreme Court decides on the constitutionality of the Voting Rights Act.

Plaintiff’s attorney Jason Gazewood says he is concerned that the Board will stall until it’s too late to implement a new redistricting plan. That’s what happened in 2012, when the Court allowed the flawed plan to govern who got to vote for which state legislator to go into effect temporarily because of lack of time.

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