Supreme Court to Take up Virginia Congressional Redistricting. The Supreme Court agreed to take up the Virginia Congressional redistricting case today. In a sign of serious concern to Virginia’s Congressional Republican delegation, the Supreme Court is asking the parties to explain why they have the right to appeal the case when none of them represent the challenged Third Congressional District. As with most of these things there are one guaranteed set of winners…the lawyers.
Supreme Court to Take up Virginia Congressional Redistricting
written by Paul A. Prados
November 13, 2015
4 comments
Paul A. Prados
Having fallen prey to the allure of DC politics in college, Paul escaped only to make the similar judgment error of going to law school. Trained at the side of a sitting state Senator, Paul is now the owner of a law firm in Reston, Virginia. In previous years Paul built a base of support on Twitter @ppradoslaw and founded and wrote for a blog on Virginia politics and legal procedure northernvirginialawyer.blogspot.com. As a pro-life libertarian, Paul finds himself at home within the broader conservative movement, and believes in a big tent Republican Party. In May 2016 Paul was elected as Chairman of the 11th Congressional District Republican Committee. Paul resides in western Fairfax County with his wife and children.
4 comments
This is a very odd situation. I guess the Republicans could ask for a stay in the 4th Circuit.
Wow. Paul, in your view what does this do to the pending redrawing of the lines? If we wait for SCOTUS oral arguments and decision, won’t that put us past the time when we need to have the lines settled for 2016? Or will the 4th Circuit continue full speed ahead?
We may know as soon as next week if the 3 judge panel intends to stall the redrawing process. If not, we could have a chaotic situation where the lines are redrawn, and everyone is operating under new districts until June 2016. At that time, the Supreme Court could issue a ruling upholding the 2011 districts, and then they would all revert. This would arguably be in time for the November election, but would cause great headaches. Given the timing of the SC grant of the writ of certiorari we can expect oral argument in the spring.
This is indeed BIG news.