North Carolina Court of Appeals rejects 'fair elections' lawsuit [View all]
The North Carolina Court of Appeals dismissed a lawsuit brought by 11 voters challenging partisan gerrymandering in the state, upholding a lower court decision that the objections to the maps raised “non-justiciable political questions.”
Represented by former Republican state Supreme Court Justice Bob Orr, the voters challenged the constitutionality of the 2024 state and federal legislative districts drawn by the General Assembly in 2023 to heavily favor Republicans. They made the case that North Carolina’s constitution contains an implicit promise of fair elections, or its other guarantees of fundamental rights would be meaningless.
In a brief 13-page unpublished opinion released Wednesday, Judge Chris Freeman wrote that because the lawsuit’s central claim is “at its core an allegation that the General Assembly acted to change districts to give one party or group an advantage in the upcoming election,” it lies beyond the authority of the state courts.
“Plaintiffs rely on an unenumerated right to fair elections as the limitation on the General Assembly’s authority to gerrymander on a partisan basis,” Freeman wrote. “Because we review whether the General Assembly violated an express provision of our constitution, plaintiffs’ reliance on an unenumerated right cannot be the basis for an unconstitutional act of the General Assembly.”
https://ncnewsline.com/briefs/north-carolina-court-of-appeals-rejects-fair-elections-lawsuit/
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