Editorial: Court should open GOP gerrymander files to reveal depth of unfairness

North Carolinians need to know all the details of how legislative leaders manipulated and gerrymandered to grossly and disproportionately favor one political party – in this case Republicans – over all others.

From the snippets of information revealed, there’s little doubt that the plotting produced elections where Republicans would get just half the votes but win overwhelming majorities of the state’s legislative and congressional seats. This is not fair or appropriate by any logic.

North Carolina citizens must know all the details of how congressional and legislative districts came to be. This information shows how politicians worked to severely limit the choices for voters, depending on where they lived and the political party they affiliated with. Voters should have known these details BEFORE the maps were adopted and became law.

The plans were rapidly forced through the legislature. There was no substantive or meaningful open committee meetings to learn the process by which the maps came to be, no opportunities to offer alternatives and no chances to debate the plans.

The gerrymandered maps developed for and by the state’s GOP legislative leaders were so awful the U.S. Supreme Court condemned them even while also saying it had no authority to stop them.

State Superior Court Judges Alma Hinton of Halifax County, Paul Ridgeway of Wake County and Joseph Crosswhite of Iredell County have an opportunity to clear the fog of political machinations, including inaccurate or unfounded claims that: Legislators and Republican Party’s lawyers were denied opportunities to review the files; Hofeller is dead and can’t testify as to the files’ authenticity; The files were obtained by unsavory means and that “lust for these documents … overcame any normal ethical judgement.”

Former Court of Appeals Judge Bob Hunter, who is representing Hofeller’s business partner in the matter, while contending his client owns the files, said he doesn’t object to disclosure of some of the key documents – 45 identified files in all.

The court should rule the information is of VERY significant public interest so everyone can see just how North Carolina’s elections have been gerrymandered. A tiny minority should not be empowered to force a radical agenda that does not represent the will or wishes of a majority of the state’s voters.

It will offer even more evidence that it is past time to adopt a non-partisan system to fairly elect our members of Congress and state legislators who truly represent and are accountable to them.