Orange County Register: State Supreme Court rejects redistricting challenge

GOP’s redistricting lawsuits thrown out

by Martin Wisckol, Politics reporter - October 26th, 2011, 5:06 pm

Orange County Register

The state Supreme Court today threw out Republican lawsuits seeking to erase newly drawn district lines for Congress and the state Senate, according to the Associated Press.

The lines were drawn earlier this year by the independent, bipartisan Citizen Redistricting Commission, which was approved by voters in an effort to remove the politics and bipartisan gerrymandering that has occurred when the Legislature draws the lines. The new lines are expected to reduce the number of districts that strongly favor one party or the other, and create more competitive districts.

But the new lines could also help Democrats gain the two-thirds majority required in the Senate to hike tax without Republican support. The suit challenging the Senate districts, which listed Laguna Niguel GOP activist Julie Vandermost as the plaintiff, alleged the new lines unfairly favored Democrats.

Republicans continue to work to qualify a ballot measure calling for the new Senate districts to be thrown out. Should the party collect enough signatures to qualify a referendum, the party would be able to trigger a stay and the Senate lines would not be in place for candidates to run in the June primaries, according to AP.

The GOP legal challenge of the congressional districts was an unusual instance of Republicans suing for Latinos and blacks in Los Angeles County to get better representation. That was the argument in the suit, in which plaintiffs were represented by Irvine lawyer Steve Baric, vice chairman of the California Republican Party. But Republicans were also upset with the new congressional lines because they felt they favored Democrats more than the old lines.