Redistricting hearing signals coming end to map-making saga

The panel's decision should come soon. Filing in state legislative races begins Feb. 12, and without finished maps, a number of incumbents and potential challengers, including some in Wake County, won't know in which districts they're running.

There's also the prospect of another appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, which could come quickly following the lower court's decision.

That decision was later backed by the Supreme Court, and the General Assembly was ordered last year to redraw those districts. The three-judge panel was unsatisfied by that redraw, done by the same GOP-aligned expert who drew the initial maps, so the court brought in its own expert to take a crack.

The question now: Did this "special master" fix constitutional problems the court found in previous versions?

Indeed he did, attorneys who initially challenged the Republican maps argued Friday.

The Republican side contended that the court shouldn't have brought in a special master, arguing that redistricting power is vested in the legislature and that the legislature's latest maps satisfied court directives.

Only nine districts are at issue at this point in the case. The Southern Coalition for Social Justice argued that, in these districts, Republicans either failed to fix the racial gerrymander or they exceeded the court's mandate, redrawing districts they didn't have to if their aim was simply to follow the court's order.

In tinkering with those districts, the legislative majority ran afoul of the North Carolina state constitution, attorneys said, because it forbids redrawing election maps mid-decade unless ordered to do so by a federal court. Normal redistricting takes place every 10 years, following the U.S. census, which means the next round will come in 2021, regardless of how this case turns out.

Much of the argument Friday, and in briefs leading up to the hearing, focused on whether Republican-drawn districts look too similar to districts already thrown out. The GOP's map-making expert was told not to even look at racial data, but he would have known where minority voters lived without consulting a database, the Southern Coalition argued, due to his past experience making North Carolina maps.

Several times on Friday, special master Nathaniel Persily, a Stanford University law professor, testified that the GOP's redrawn lines "closely tracked" previous ones, taking in many of the same majority-black neighborhoods.

Phil Strach, an attorney for the lawmakers, produced an expert for his side to who testified that it was Persily who relied on racial data in drawing his districts. Strach has noted repeatedly that the legislature gave written instructions to its map-maker that race should not be used in redrawing the maps.

"The way you remedy the use of a quota is you take the quota out," Strach said.

The judges did not indicate when they will rule. At one point 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge James Wynn took Strach and his expert to task for attempting to poke holes in Persily's work after the fact instead of submitting comments once Persily's first draft became public.

That might have helped draw better maps, Wynn said, adding that he was "sort of miffed."

Wynn and U.S. District Judge Catherine Eagles, who heads the panel, were appointed to the federal bench by President Barack Obama. The third member, U.S. District Judge Thomas Schroeder, was appointed by President George W. Bush.