From WRAL: 12 N Carolina legislative districts remain illegal
It’s no surprise that the new legislative maps are more of the same. The lawyers who brought the original suit against the previous maps are asking the courts for another redraw. They argue that 12 of the redrawn districts are still illegally silencing minority voices. It’s still unclear when the courts will rule on the new maps.
Illegal and unconstitutional boundaries remain within North Carolina’s new state legislative districts, lawyers who sued successfully over the old maps told federal judges Friday while asking for another redraw.
In a court filing, the lawyers for voters found fault with 12 General Assembly House and Senate districts in the maps approved by legislative Republicans two weeks ago. The judges should redraw the boundaries in the areas where the districts are located using alternatives the plaintiffs offered to legislators last month, or send the job to a third-party expert, the filing says.
“What we filed today is no different from what we told the General Assembly before they passed these new districts,” Anita Earls, one of the voters’ attorneys from the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, said in a news release. “It is now the court’s responsibility to fix the problem.”
