SCOTUS shoots down GOP's attempts to block congressional maps in Pennsylvania and North Carolina

On Monday, the Supreme Court turned away a pair of Republican lawsuits that sought to use an untested far-right legal theory to block state courts in North Carolina and Pennsylvania from adopting new, fair congressional maps.

In the case of North Carolina, the state Supreme Court had struck down the maps passed by the legislature as an illegal political gerrymander that violated the state constitution; in Pennsylvania, the state Supreme Court chose a map after the Republican legislature and Democratic governor failed to agree on a compromise.

The plaintiffs in both cases wanted the Supreme Court to invalidate both of these processes, and allow the legislature to adopt gerrymandered Republican maps as they wish, under a doctrine called the "independent state legislature theory". This theory holds that the text of the Elections Clause of the U.S. Constitution grants state legislatures, and only state legislatures, the power to draw maps, and thus state courts cannot be involved in the process — even if the state's constitution separately has redistricting rules and the legislature violates those rules.

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This doctrine was last considered at the Supreme Court during the 2015 case Arizona Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, when the Republican-controlled legislature argued it infringed on the power of the legislature for voters to pass a ballot referendum creating an independent commission for redistricting. The Court ruled against them — although every conservative justice still on the bench would have ruled for the legislature.

The decision not to block the North Carolina court was 6-3. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch dissented, suggesting they were sympathetic to the independent state legislature theory. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, meanwhile, said he thought it was a "serious argument" the court should consider, but that invalidating the power of the state courts and throwing out maps this close to an election was improper.