Speaker 1: And now it's time for our daily Bloomberg Law Brief,
Speaker 1: exploring legal issues in the news. Today, Bloomberg Law host
Speaker 1: Un Grosso and Greg Sture discussed the Supreme Court taking
Speaker 1: up a case on partisan jerrymandering in the American electoral system.
Speaker 1: They speak to Rick Hessen, founder of the Election Law
Speaker 1: Blog and professor at U c Irvine, and Josh Douglas,
Speaker 1: a professor at the University of Kentucky Law School. Rick,
Speaker 1: will you start by describing the case from Wisconsin that
Speaker 1: the justices will be considering. This is one of a
Speaker 1: number of cases involving partisan jerrymandering that has been working
Speaker 1: his way up the courts. The claim here is that
Speaker 1: Wisconsin is basically a fifty fifty state between Democrats and Republicans,
Speaker 1: but the Republican state legislature drew the lines for their
Speaker 1: General Assembly in such a skewed way to help Republicans
Speaker 1: that Republicans are able to capture many more seats than
Speaker 1: would be done if it were a fairly drawn district. Josh,
Speaker 1: the last time the Supreme Court really dealt with this
Speaker 1: issue was back in twenty four. Can you describe where
Speaker 1: the court left us after that case? Yeah? Well, the
Speaker 1: Court didn't answer questions as much as provided more of them. Uh.
Speaker 1: For justices UH said that there was no standard by
Speaker 1: which to test a partisan jymander. That is, courts basically
Speaker 1: shouldn't be involved in resolving these kinds of cases because
Speaker 1: it was not of a judicial nature and esteat as
Speaker 1: a political question. The four other justices, the four so
Speaker 1: called liberal justice each came up with a standard. Uh.
Speaker 1: They said, here's a good standard for courts to use,
Speaker 1: and we think it's susceptible. And Justice Kennedy was in
Speaker 1: the middle, and he said, I don't like any of
Speaker 1: the standards that anyone has proposed so far, but I'm
Speaker 1: not going to close the door to any future standard emerging.
Speaker 1: So you had with kind of a four one four
Speaker 1: decision in which Justice Kennedy holds all the keys to power.
Speaker 1: If he likes the standards, then maybe we'll have the
Speaker 1: ability to police partisan darrymandering. If he doesn't, then there'll
Speaker 1: be no way for course to do so. So Rick,
Speaker 1: the Court has been reluctant to take up partisan jerrymandering
Speaker 1: since that case. Why did they take up this case?
Speaker 1: This case came up directly from a three judge appeals Court.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, three judge district court directly on appeal to
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court. And when cases come up in this
Speaker 1: unusual way, when the Supreme Court decides not to hear
Speaker 1: that case, it means the lower court got the ruling right.
Speaker 1: And so this was a rare case where a lower
Speaker 1: court said, yes, this is a partisan gerrymander. And so
Speaker 1: if the court decided not to hear that case, it
Speaker 1: would have sent the signal that yes, courts are in
Speaker 1: the business of policing these things, but we're not going
Speaker 1: to tell you what the standard is. And that is
Speaker 1: Rick Hessen, a professor at u c Irvine, and Josh Douglas,
Speaker 1: a professor at the University of Kentucky Law School, speaking
Speaker 1: to Bloomberg Law host June Grosso and Greg Store. You
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