During this week’s oral arguments in a Supreme Court case called Gill v. Whitford that will have huge implications for our democracy, PFAW joined the hundreds of people rallying outside the Court to show support for ending partisan gerrymandering.
As recently as 2015, the Supreme Court has acknowledged that partisan gerrymandering is “incompatible with democratic principles.” But the Court has never identified a specific unconstitutional partisan gerrymander.
However, that might be exactly what we have in Gill v. Whitford, which is a challenge to the gerrymandering of a district by Wisconsin Republicans. It was part of a Republican redistricting plan so extreme that, in the election immediately following the redrawing of the state’s legislative districts, Republicans won a mere 48% of the vote in state legislative races but captured or retained roughly two thirds of the total seats.
In a democracy, voters should choose our elected officials – not the other way around.
For more on this case and the other high-impact cases being heard by the Supreme Court this term, check out our recent SCOTUS term preview report from our affiliate PFAW Foundation.