This week- Newburgh VRA lawsuit, Can An Election Be Postponed?, State Redistricting Commission Approves New Budget, VRA Preclearance Action, Around the Nation: Texas, Ohio, New Jersey, Events
By Jeff Wice, Stephen Louis and Alexis Marking
LITIGATION
Orange County: Clarke et al. v. Newburgh (N.Y. Voting Rights Act)
This challenge to the Town of Newburgh’s board is now scheduled for a non-jury trial on July 21st. Parties must provide the status of the application to the Appellate Division for leave to appeal to the Court of Appeals by June 27th.
On June 20th, the court was updated on the defendants’ application to the higher court. By a decision and order on May 23rd, the Appellate Division granted Newburgh’s (defendants’) motion for leave to appeal to the Court of Appeals, and stayed further proceedings before this Court pending the hearing and determination of the appeal by the Court of Appeals. The Court has set a briefing schedule and calendared the appeal to be hard during its October 2025 term.
This case was moved from Orange County to Westchester County after a number of Orange County judges recused themselves from the case.
ELECTIONS
Tomorrow (6/24) is New York Primary Day. Voters who have not already voted through early voting or by sending in an absentee ballot are eligible to vote in tomorrow’s party primaries.
What happens when you have an election taking place during a heat wave? Are there a precedent to look to?
For years, heat has been the leading cause of weather-related deaths in the United States, and at its most severe, can be considered a disaster. We are in an unfortunate situation where public officials are on the one hand urging people to turn out to vote, while at the same time urging them to take precautions from the heat, which typically would include minimizing travel. But in the discussion of the upcoming heat wave and its impact on primary day, there’s been no major mention of the “nuclear option” – the postponement of the primary election.
The most prominent precedent for postponement of an election was on 9/11. Governor Pataki issued an emergency executive order, pursuant to Executive Law section 29-a, suspending Election Law section 8-100 relating to the date of the primary election, and other laws relating to the primary. Ultimately the date was re-set by a special session of the State Legislature.
Section 29-a authorizes the Governor to suspend laws, both state and local, in cases of disaster. While the definition of “disaster” in Executive Law section 20 does not explicitly include heat among its examples, it clearly includes dangerous heat situations.
Note that Election Law 3-108 has a provision that authorizes boards of election to add an extra voting day for general elections, if in case of a disaster, turnout is low – less than 25% of registered voters – but that does not apply to primary elections.)
REDISTRICTING
State Independent Redistricting Commission Meets, Approves Budget
The state’s Independent Redistricting Commission met in Albany on June 20 to approve a new $932,935 operating budget for the current state fiscal year. The commissioners also received a report from Co-Executive Directors Karen Blatt and Doug Breakell on population trends since 2020.
From the Co-Directors report:
1. While other states saw population growth New York has lost population but the loss is slowing down.
2. Growth was seen in Westchester (+.20%), Ulster (+.75%), Dutchess (.99%), Orange (+2.6%) and Rockland (+2.9%)
3. Declines were seen in The Bronx (-5.97%),Kings (-4.34%), Queens (-3.68%), New York (-2.02%), and Richmond (-.40%)
4. Orange, Suffolk, and Rockland experienced the most growth since 2020.
5. Kings, Queens, and The Bronx experienced decreases since 2020.
6. Otsego County had the largest percentage increase of 3.43%. Orange County had the largest numerical increase (411,767)
7. The Bronx had the largest percentage decrease (-5.97%). Richmond County had the largest percentage increase (+.40%)
8. New York City experienced population decline, although the population increased by 87,184 in the last year.
All of the numbers represent population estimates provided by the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.
Commission Chair Ken Jenkins also introduced the newest member of the Commission, Jamie Laredo of Monroe County who was appointed to fill a vacancy be Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart Cousins.
VOTING RIGHTS ACT PRECLEARANCE
N.Y. Attorney General’s Office Preclearance Updates
641 Monroe Co. Board of Elections- poll site locations- preliminarily granted
Numbers refer to submisson numbers
All submissions can be viewed at: https://nyvra-portal.ag.ny.gov/
AROUND THE NATION
Texas Re-redistricting Deja Vu? Republicans in Texas and Ohio are debating whether to push a new congressional map through the state legislatures to help strengthen the GOP’s hold on the U.S. House majority. In Texas, a special session of the legislature is apparently being urged by President Donald Trump’s political operatives. A new map would involve moving GOP voters from safe red districts into blue ones, making such moves risky in a Democratic election year. While redistricting is usually restricted to a once-a decade process or where courts require a redrawing to correct legal infirmities, the U.S. Supreme Court has not prohibited states to redraw maps in mid-decade unless state law prohibits it. Texas re-redistricted for partisan gain- and no other reason- in the mid 2000s decade. Any action to enact a new map is likely to face prolonged litigation, making changes of having a new plan in place in 2026 questionable.
Ohio is required to redraw its congressional districts before 2026 due to a state constitutional requirement that the map must be redrawn if the map used after the 2022 elections was not drawn on a bipartisan basis. In Ohio, minority party Democrats will have a larger voice in the process, unlike in Texas.
New York is prohibited from redrawing its districts before 2031 unless directed to do so by a court. However, state senate lines could change if a party were to bring a challenge in state court arguing that the current map was enacted by a state court and that the state independent redistricting commission and legislature should complete the decade’s task. This point was made in a New York Daily News editorial on June 19th. Nevertheless, the later a challenge might be filed, the chances of a new map remain remote.
New Jersey: The New Jersey Supreme Court has rejected a challenge to a municipal political district drawing, which could have caused a wave of redistricting lawsuits across New Jersey. The lawsuit focused on Jersey City wards, alleging that the addition of wealthy high-rise residents into low-income wards diluted the voting power of low-income residents to elect a candidate that prioritized their interests (e.g., low-income housing).
According to Bloomberg Law, this case also acts as “a microcosm for a broader battle—how courts should judge the compactness of districts and rights of communities split by lines in municipal, legislative, and congressional maps that all require some form of compact shape.” The court ruled in a rare 4-3 split that judges do not need to consider mathematical formulas or community cohesion when deciding whether a political district meets the New Jersey mandate for “compactness.”
More than a dozen groups had challenged this drawing together. In a statement, the groups argued the ruling creates a “new precedence which dilutes the right to fair and effective representation on the local level.”
While “a detailed explanation of a ward commission’s compactness determination would better inform the public and facilitate judicial review,” according to the court majority, the state law does not require map-drawing commissions to meet the requirements that community advocacy groups are arguing for in this lawsuit.
INSTITUTE RESOURCES
The New York Elections, Census and Redistricting Institute has archived many resources for the public to view on our Digital Commons Page.
Our Redistricting Resources page contains resources on the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act. You can access the page
here: https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/redistricting_resources/
Archived Updates can be accessed
here: https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/redistricting_roundtable_updates/
Please share this weekly update with your colleagues. To be added to the mailing list, please contact Jeffrey.wice@nyls.edu
The N.Y. Elections, Census & Redistricting Institute is supported by grants from the New York Community Trust, New York Census Equity Fund and the New York City Council. This report was prepared by Jeff Wice, Stephen Louis and Alexis Marking.