SCOTUS calls for redo on Washington state voting maps

The Supreme Court on Monday vacated lower court rulings that had upheld a Washington state redistricting map drawn to address Latino vote dilution in the Yakima Valley, sending the case back to the Ninth Circuit.

The remand follows the Court's own April ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, which weakened Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and changed the legal standard the Ninth Circuit had applied just last year.

Two voters who intervened in the case, Jose Trevino and Alex Ybarra, argued the remedial map was itself a racial gerrymander; the voting rights groups who won the original case say those two never had standing to begin with.

Washington state, notably, is on neither side here exactly — it fought the original lawsuit, then conceded it, then is now asking for the whole thing to be redone under new rules.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.