2024 Congressional Election Thread

(The Guardian) Supreme court orders Louisiana to draw another majority-black congressional district
The supreme court has just ordered Louisiana to draw another majority Black congressional district, after earlier this month striking down congressional maps in Alabama that the justices found discriminated against African-American voters.

CNN reports that the justices, with no dissents noted, lifted a hold placed on an order from a lower court that told the state to redraw its maps. Despite a third of its population being African American, the Republican-dominated legislature in the state last year approved a map that includes only one majority Black district.

While the court has now struck down both Alabama and Louisiana’s maps for not properly representing their Black populations, the justices had allowed those states’ maps to remain in effect for the 2022 midterm elections. Majority Black districts tend to lean Democratic, and CNN supreme court analyst Steve Vladeck said the court’s decision, along with its lack of an explanation for the move, raises questions about the court’s intentions. “Like the Alabama ruling, it doesn’t explain why the court nevertheless had issued emergency relief to allow Louisiana to use its unlawful maps during the 2022 midterm cycle,” he said. “It puts the court’s interventions last year into ever-sharper perspective.”

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Louisiana and Alabama are not the only states where Republican-led legislatures will be forced to withdraw their congressional maps because of the supreme court’s recent Voting Rights Act ruling.

Georgia may the next state to redraw its maps, according to Anthony Michael Kreis, a law professor at Georgia State University:


But as Kreis told the Georgia Recorder earlier this month, Democrats may not benefit from the redrawn maps. He expects a new district to appear north of Atlanta that will still have a “pinkish hue”.

(The Guardian) Moore v Harper: the impacts of the supreme court's ruling
The impacts of the supreme court’s ruling in Moore v Harper extend to redistricting, and beyond.

Its most immediate effect is to preserve longstanding norms over state courts’ ability to weigh in on legislatures’ actions when it comes to federal elections, as the Guardian’s Sam Levine reports: The 6-3 decision in Moore v Harper is a blow to North Carolina Republicans who had asked the court to embrace the so-called independent state legislature theory – the idea that the US constitution does not allow state courts to limit the power of state legislatures when it comes to federal elections. Such a decision in the case would have been a major win for Republicans, who control more state legislatures than Democrats do. Some of the conservative justices on the court had urged the bench to embrace the idea.

“We will have to resolve this question sooner or later, and the sooner we do so, the better,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in a dissent at an earlier stage in the case that was joined by Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas. “If the language of the elections clause is taken seriously, there must be some limit on the authority of state courts to countermand actions taken by state legislatures when they are prescribing rules for the conduct of federal elections.”

The court’s decision means that state courts can continue to weigh in on disputes over federal election rules. State courts have become increasingly popular forums for hearing those disputes, especially after the US supreme court said in 2019 that federal courts could not address partisan gerrymandering.

But Michael McDonald, a University of Florida political science professor focusing on American elections, sees broader implications in the justices’ rejection of the fringe independent state legislature (ISL) theory, which Republican lawmakers from North Carolina has asked them to endorse in the case:

(The Guardian) After the supreme court’s ruling in Moore v Harper, the Senate’s Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said democracy advocates “can stand a bit taller.”

Here’s his full statement: Today those who support democracy, fair elections and the rule of law can stand a bit taller. Today’s ruling reaffirms the longstanding precedent that respects our constitutional system of checks and balances. There is still much work to do to protect American democracy. As John Lewis said, ‘Democracy is not a state. It is an act,’ which is why Senate Democrats will continue to fight for free and fair elections.

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Chuck Schumer may say that “Senate Democrats will continue to fight for free and fair elections”, but actually doing so is easier said than done.

Democrats’ slim majority in the Senate and the availability of the filibuster to the GOP means passing legislation to address the issues that worry democracy advocates most – think partisan gerrymandering, or restrictions on ballot box access that can disenfranchise certain groups – appears beyond their abilities in this Congress. And if those weren’t obstacles enough, the House’s Republican leaders have shown little willingness to consider such legislation.

Indeed, voting rights legislation wasn’t mentioned by Schumer in an interview published by Politico today, in which the Senate majority leader outlined his legislative priorities: After spending six months focused on confirming President Joe Biden’s nominees and fighting off GOP regulatory rollbacks, the Senate majority leader is planning to pivot into bipartisan policymaking mode. During an interview with POLITICO, Schumer outlined an enterprising agenda that includes must-pass bills on defense, aviation and farm policy, as well as long-held priorities like marijuana banking and China competitiveness.

That’s on top of a rail safety plan that could run into a wall of GOP resistance and a challenging push to lower prescription drug prices — plus more. And any of those bills risk falling to a filibuster by Republicans who are deciding whether they’re in a mood to compromise before the 2024 election, which could give them control of the Senate.

“There are a bunch of Republicans in the Senate who want to work with us,” Schumer said in an interview. “We’ll try to get as many [bills] done as we can. Legislating in the Senate with the rules we have is not easy, right? But if you push ahead, we’re going to get some good things done.”

(The Guardian) Hill Harper, an actor known for his roles on “The Good Doctor” and “CSI: NY”, has announced he is running for Michigan’s Senate seat.

Harper is the sixth Democratic candidate to enter the race to replace retiring Democratic senator Debbie Stabenow, who announced in January that she would not be seeking a fifth term in 2024 in the battleground state.

Harper faces a tough test challenging Elissa Slotkin, a three-term Democratic House member who has raised $5.8m in just over four months, according to her campaign.

In an interview with The Associated Press before his announcement, Harper said that not being a “career politician” would serve as an advantage in Congress and that he plans to run a campaign “powered by the people, for the people”.

(The Guardian) The 2024 election will also decide control of the Senate, where Republicans are currently viewed as having a good shot at retaking the majority.

Joe Biden’s allies can afford to lose only one seat in the chamber, but three Democrats representing red states will be up for re-election: Joe Manchin of West Virginia (who has not said if he will run again), Jon Tester of Montana and Sherrod Brown of Ohio (both of whom say they will run again). All face tough roads to keeping their seats.

Then there’s the possibility that the GOP could oust a Democrat representing a swing state, such as Wisconsin. Democratic senator Tammy Baldwin is up for re-election there, but in something of a setback for Republicans, Tom Tiffany announced today that he has decided to run for re-election in the House of Representatives rather than challenge Baldwin, as some in the GOP hoped he would do:

(The Guardian) West Virginia’s Democratic senator Joe Manchin is expected to skip the White House’s celebration next week of the Inflation Reduction Act’s first anniversary as he considers switching his party affiliation.

Manchin’s decision to skip the event on the IRA (which he helped draft), which NBC first reported on Friday, comes as the conservative Democratic said in a radio interview with MetroNews that he has been “absolutely” thinking about changing his party affiliation to Independent “for quite some time.”

Manchin said that he has been “thinking seriously what’s best for” him, adding, “I want to be able to speak honestly about, basically, the extremes of the Democrat and Republican Party that is harming our nation.”

Last month, Manchin said that he has not yet made a decision on whether he will run for president. Nevertheless, he said during a town hall, “I’ve been in races to win. If I get in a race, I’m gonna win,” adding that both the Republican and Democratic parties will be “in trouble” if a third party enters the picture of the 2024 race.

Should Manchin decide to leave the Democratic party, he will follow in the footsteps of Arizona senator Kyrsten Sinema, who last December announced her affiliation switch to Independent.