New Map Must Be Used in November – RedState

BIG news out of the eighth Circuit Court of Appeals late Monday as a three-judge panel (in a 2-1 vote) has now affirmed a district court non permanent restraining order concerning the continuing dispute over Missouri’s congressional redistricting efforts.

It’s been fairly a curler coaster trip of late in the Show-Me State concerning the state’s congressional map. I must confess that I used to be one of those who thought that once the first election was held utilizing the new 7-1 map (aka “Missouri First” or HB 1), issues had been pretty effectively settled on the matter. Boy, was I mistaken.

In the span of roughly a week, we obtained: 

• Missouri Supreme Court (which had beforehand held it constitutional for the legislature to conduct mid-decade redistricting and additional discovered the 7-1 map sufficiently compact) holds that the referendum petition concerning the new map was legitimate and well timed and must be positioned on the November poll, that means (principally) that HB 1 never took impact and the 2022 congressional map remained in place.
• U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh denies Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins’ software for keep of SCOMO judgment.
• District Judge Stephen Clark (Eastern District of Missouri) points non permanent restraining order (TRO) prohibiting Hoskins from utilizing any map other than HB 1 — the new map — for the November 3 basic election.
• Hoskins points directive to local election officers to finalize ballots based on the HB 1 map — i.e., the 7-1 map.
• eighth Circuit Court of Appeals denies referendum supporters’ movement for keep pending appeal and for abstract reversal of Clark’s TRO, noting that it could lack jurisdiction to review the TRO at all.
• SCOTUS steps in and stays Clark’s TRO pending the disposition of the appeal in the eighth Circuit, and any subsequent petition for Supreme Court review.
• SCOMO holds Hoskins in contempt for violating its order but also finds that he purged the contempt by notifying local election authorities of the SCOMO order and directing them to use the 2022 map.
• eighth Circuit says: “Submit your briefs; we’ll hear oral argument on Thursday.”

As an added wrinkle, Friday (September 18) was the deadline for election authorities to ship out abroad and army ballots under the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act (UOCAVA), so a fast turnaround from the eighth Circuit was anticipated.

That put the case before a three-judge eighth Circuit panel Thursday morning, with the judges effectively conscious that the clock was ticking. So, here is what they ruled: 

The court holds that because Missouri performed the August major under the 2025 map, switching to the 2022 map for the November basic election would violate Article I, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution. The court’s key level is that the first and basic election are elements of one course of for selecting members of Congress, and that requires “continuity in the constituency throughout all stages of a single election.”

So, the court affirms Clark’s TRO and remands the case to the district court with instructions to enter a everlasting injunction barring Hoskins — and people performing in live performance with him — from utilizing something other than the 2025/HB 1 map for the November election.

BUT…the district court is instructed to keep that everlasting injunction until Monday, September 28, at 5 p.m. Central, particularly to give People Not Politicians (PNP — the group behind the referendum) time to search Supreme Court review. If SCOTUS hasn’t stayed or altered it by then, Hoskins and local election officers must implement the 2025 map.

Some other key elements of this ruling:

• The court does not resolve the Equal Protection or the Elections Clause points. They say the plaintiffs make a colorable Equal Protection argument and call the district court’s analysis compelling, but because Article I § 2 resolves the case, they refuse to attain either that declare or the Elections Clause declare.
• The court turns PNP’s argument on the Purcell precept (the concept that federal courts ought to keep away from altering election guidelines close to Election Day) fully around. The majority says the related established order is the 2025 map, because candidates filed and campaigned under it and 1.2 million Missourians voted under it in August. In their view, it was the Missouri Supreme Court’s September 3 determination that disrupted the election established order. They expressly say “Purcell supports, not prevents,” their ruling.
• Even the election-administration downside didn’t stop them. They acknowledge that the UOCAVA ballot-transmission deadline handed September 18, but maintain that wasn’t a level of no return, citing the supply of hardship waivers and instances in which ballots had been modified after abroad/absentee ballots had already been despatched.
• They reject every procedural escape hatch PNP provided: appellate jurisdiction, three-judge-court requirement, alleged collusion/lack of adversity, Rooker-Feldman (federal trial courts typically cannot act as appeals courts reviewing state-court judgments), Younger (federal courts typically should not intervene with sure ongoing state-court proceedings), mootness, and the bond issue. In fact, they notice that PNP never really requested a three-judge court below — and, regardless, a single decide might issue a TRO.
• The court squarely addresses the dueling-court-orders mess. The Supremacy Clause means the Missouri Supreme Court’s state-law injunction must yield to the federal constitutional ruling. The majority even says: “The Court trusts that the Missouri Supreme Court will respect this Court’s decision under the Supremacy Clause.” 

As famous above, the choice was 2-1, with Judge David Stras dissenting only on the issue of standing. He doesn’t take issue with the bulk’s core Article I, Section 2 analysis — in fact, he opens his dissent by calling it a “probable violation of Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution as interpreted.” His disagreement is that the court ought to never have gotten there. His reasoning is a bit nuanced, and will keep for another day.

Here’s the underside line: Per today’s eighth Circuit ruling, Missouri can’t maintain the 2 halves of the same congressional election utilizing two different units of districts. Because voters selected the events’ congressional nominees under the 2025 map in August, shifting district traces before the November basic election would go away a whole bunch of hundreds of voters selecting among candidates that they had no alternative to nominate — while their major votes helped choose candidates they may no longer vote for in November. 

Practically talking, however, nothing modifications just yet. The 2022 map stays in place while the eighth Circuit’s everlasting injunction is stayed through 5 p.m. Central on September 28, giving PNP a week to ask the Supreme Court to intervene. If SCOTUS would not do so by then, Missouri election officers may have to change back to the 2025 map for November — which implies this curler coaster could have one more slightly consequential flip or loop left in it.

Editor’s Note: The 2026 Midterms will decide the destiny of President Trump’s America First agenda. Republicans must keep control of both chambers of Congress.

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