Kentucky Democratic Party suing over Republicans’ redistricting maps
The Kentucky Democratic Party announced Thursday it’s suing over congressional and state legislative redistricting maps the commonwealth’s Republican-run legislature approved earlier this month.
The lawsuit claims the Republican-crafted maps for both Kentucky’s six seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and for the state House of Representatives’ districts violates the Kentucky Constitution, according to a KDP news release.
The Democratic Party announced the lawsuit minutes after Republican lawmakers overrode Gov. Andy Beshear’s veto of the Kentucky House redistricting plan and as they worked toward overriding his veto of the new congressional map.
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The lawsuit claims the Kentucky House and congressional maps both involve “extreme partisan gerrymandering,” which violates the state Constitution “by arbitrarily denying the citizens of the Commonwealth the rights to a free and equal election, free expression, and free association.”
The complaint, a copy of which KDP sent to The Courier Journal, also claims the state House map runs afoul of the constitution by “excessively and unnecessarily splitting counties into multiple districts without a legitimate purpose.”
The state Democratic Party said it is joined by several other plaintiffs in the lawsuit, including House Democratic Caucus Chair Derrick Graham, of Frankfort, and four Franklin County residents. They want the Franklin Circuit Court to declare the redistricting legislation creating these new maps invalid and to prevent the May primary election from being conducted based on these Republican-drawn districts.
“These maps were drawn behind closed doors with no public input to silence the voices of hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians,” KDP Chair Colmon Elridge said. “We are joining residents who are disenfranchised by these gerrymandered districts to stop this partisan power grab.”
Republican lawmakers have supermajorities in the legislature, putting them in full control of Kentucky’s redistricting process for the first time in history.
This week, a Louisville Republican filed a proposal to delay Kentucky’s primary election to August in case his party’s redistricting plans get tied up in court.
Suit targets James Comer’s district
The lawsuit highlights U.S. Rep. James Comer’s redrawn 1st Congressional District as an example of the “extreme partisan gerrymandering” it claims is unconstitutional.
Part of the 1st District got shifted further northeast and took Franklin County out of Rep. Andy Barr’s 6th Congressional District under the new map Republican lawmakers crafted.
The lawsuit claims that was unnecessary and politically motivated, saying: “By going out of its way to move Franklin County into the 1st District, the map intentionally dilutes the votes of Democratic voters in Franklin County by attaching them to faraway counties in Western Kentucky to form a district where Republican voters will easily cancel out their votes.”
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