Federal Court Strikes Down Republican Gerrymanders in Michigan

The Michigan GOP intentionally discriminated against Democrats, the judges found.

Demonstrators rally outside the Michigan Hall of Justice in Lansing on July 18, 2018, in support of an independent redistricting commission.Dale G. Young/AP

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

A federal court unanimously struck down legislative maps drawn by Michigan Republicans on Thursday, finding that they were guilty of “deliberately discriminating against Democratic voters.”

The ruling by a three-judge panel invalidated 34 congressional, state House, and state Senate districts that had been challenged by the League of Women Voters and Democratic plaintiffs as unconstitutional gerrymanders and ordered that they be redrawn before the 2020 election. That could give a big boost to Democrats in Michigan in 2020. In the 2018 election, under the now-invalidated maps, Democratic legislative candidates in Michigan won 52 percent of the statewide vote but picked up only 47 percent of seats in the state House.

Emails from Michigan Republicans who drew the maps, which were released as part of the federal trial, boasted of concentrating “Dem garbage” into as few districts as possible in order to maximize the GOP’s advantage.

The Michigan ruling “joins the growing chorus of federal courts that have, in recent years, held that partisan gerrymandering is unconstitutional,” the court noted. That includes rulings invalidating Republican-drawn maps in key swing states like Wisconsin and North Carolina The Supreme Court is currently weighing whether to rein in partisan gerrymandering in Maryland and North Carolina, with a decision expected in June.

Regardless of what the Supreme Court does, Michigan’s political districts will be drawn by an independent, citizen-led redistricting commission in 2021, after voters approved a ballot initiative last fall to curb gerrymandering.

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate