Three-Judge Panel Rejects Lawsuit to Redo State’s Congressional Maps

Democrats and pro-democracy organizations held a rally Oct. 16 to call for the creation of an independent redistricting commission. (Photo by Henry Redman/Wisconsin Examiner)

A three-judge panel on Tuesday dismissed a lawsuit brought by Democratic voters seeking to redraw Wisconsin’s existing congressional maps.

The lawsuit, Bothfield v. Wisconsin Elections Commission, was filed last summer arguing that the state’s congressional maps were an illegal partisan gerrymander. All but two of the state’s eight congressional districts are held by Republicans.

The dismissal marks another failure from Democrats and their allies to redraw the state’s congressional maps, which since 2011 have favored Republican candidates. Since the maps were redrawn in 2011, they have frequently been at the center of the state’s political debate.

In 2024, the state’s legislative maps, which had locked in GOP control of the state Legislature for nearly 15 years, were tossed out. Since then, attention has been focused on the congressional maps.

The current congressional maps were instituted in 2022 by the state Supreme Court after the Republican-controlled Legislature and Gov. Tony Evers were unable to reach an agreement on passing new maps themselves. The Court selected congressional maps that had been proposed by Evers. However, Democrats and anti-gerrymandering advocates have complained that those maps were proposed under the Court’s “least change” mandate, which required that any proposed maps hew as closely as possible to the 2011 maps.

The Bothfield lawsuit was filed around the same time as a separate lawsuit challenging the congressional maps on the basis that they illegally dampen the competitiveness of the state’s congressional elections. Last year, the Supreme Court ruled that both lawsuits should first be considered by panels of three circuit court judges.

The other pending lawsuit is expected to go to trial in 2027.

While the lawsuits against the maps have worked through the legal system, open government advocates and some Democrats have continued to call for changes to Wisconsin law that would take the power of map drawing out of the hands of lawmakers and ban partisan gerrymandering.

Earlier this month, Evers signed an executive order calling the Legislature into a special session to pass a proposed constitutional amendment that would ban gerrymandering.

After the panel’s decision, Republicans and their allies celebrated the ruling as a win for GOP chances in the state’s elections this fall. Republicans in several other states across the country have redrawn their congressional maps over the last year in an effort to protect the GOP majority in the U.S. House of Representatives. Retaliatory gerrymandering in Democratic states including California has attempted to tilt the playing field back in Democrats’ favor.

“This is a significant win for Republicans and a yet another blow to desperate Democrats who wanted to reshape the electoral landscape,” Zach Bannon, a spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said in a statement. “By keeping Wisconsin’s current district lines in place for 2026, Republicans are in a strong position to build on our momentum to retain and grow our House majority.”

Three-judge panel rejects lawsuit to toss Wisconsin’s congressional maps was originally published by Wisconsin Examiner.