Federal Court Upholds California’s Redrawn Maps Favoring Democrats

A three-judge panel on a federal district court on Wednesday rejected a Republican bid to overturn California’s redistricted maps, upholding the results of the Proposition 50 referendum. In a 2–1 decision, the panel in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that California’s altered maps were lawful, ruling that Republicans’ claims of racial gerrymandering motives in the redistricting did not align with the facts. “We find that Challengers have failed to show that racial gerrymandering occurred, and we conclude that there is no basis for issuing a preliminary injunction,” the court wrote in its decision. Republicans had argued that Proposition 50, which redrew California’s congressional maps to more heavily favor Democrats, constituted illegal racial gerrymandering under the Voting Rights Act....