Courts in Florida and South Carolina have each handed Republican legislatures congressional map victories that will affect the 2024 elections.
In one case, a federal three-judge panel in South Carolina ruled in favor of Republican lawmakers and will allow their congressional map to stand for this year’s elections while the U.S. Supreme Court hears claims that the map is racial gerrymandering, according to The Hill.
The map is good news for South Carolina Representative Nancy Mace, who is running for re-election to her First Congressional District seat.
The three-judge panel agreed with state lawmakers that barring the map now would be problematic for the coming elections. The panel ruled that the map can stand for this year’s election as the legality of the map is adjudicated.
“Having found that Congressional District No. 1 constitutes an unconstitutional racial gerrymander, the Court fully recognizes that ‘it would be the unusual case in which a court would be justified in not taking appropriate action to insure that no further elections are conducted under an invalid plan,’” the judges wrote in their five-page ruling.