The News: Today, the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty (WILL) released a short memorandum summarizing some of the legal history surrounding Wisconsin’s current congressional district maps along with analysis of legal issues related to the ongoing calls for the Wisconsin Supreme Court to redraw those maps before the next census and even before the next midterm election.
The Quote: WILL Deputy Counsel, Lucas Vebber, stated, “The current congressional maps—proposed by Governor Evers and adopted by the Court in 2022—are constitutional and comply with all applicable state and federal laws. While it was an effective talking point for campaigns to motivate donors and voters during the election, now reality has set in. Any attempt to redraw those district maps before the next census is futile and could easily violate the United States Constitution.”
Additional Background: As part of a WILL original action following the 2020 United States Census, the Wisconsin Supreme Court adopted congressional district maps proposed by Governor Tony Evers. In 2024, Democrats challenged those maps, and the Wisconsin Supreme Court unanimously rejected that challenge.
Our current maps, which the Wisconsin Supreme Court declined to revisit just last year on a 6-0 vote, were based on the 2011 legislatively adopted maps, which were upheld in federal court while noting their bipartisan adoption process. The current maps have then been used for the past two election cycles.
Supreme Court Precedent: Recently, the United States Supreme Court made clear in a recent landmark redistricting case Moore v. Harper that “state courts may not so exceed the bounds of ordinary judicial review as to unconstitutionally intrude upon the role specifically reserved to state legislatures.”
Any effort by the Wisconsin Supreme Court to throw out the Governor Evers map it adopted just three years ago (and declined to revisit just last year), would likely fall within what the United States Supreme Court has warned state courts could not do.
Read more:
- Memo, April 2025
