Citing time constraints for its 2023 municipal elections, Jacksonville is asking a federal court to stay an order that found the city’s new City Council and school board district maps are racially gerrymandered and must be redrawn by Nov. 8.
In an Oct. 19 motion in the Middle District of Florida, attorneys for the city asked for the stay on Judge Marcia Morales Howard’s decision earlier this month in the case of Jacksonville Branch of the NAACP v. City of Jacksonville. The NAACP argued that the approved district lines packed Black residents into four districts in an effort to minimize minority voting power.
In their argument, Jacksonville’s attorneys contend that a pending U.S. Supreme Court case involving congressional redistricting, Merrill v. Milligan, could affect the Jacksonville litigation. In addition, the plaintiffs waited too long to file a legal complaint since the policy underlying the city’s redistricting process has been in place for decades, the motion states.
“Third … the process to adopt a new map takes at least three months, meaning that the district lines the city is now working on cannot be in place by Dec. 16, 2022,” reflecting a timeline required to ensure an orderly process to carry out the March municipal elections, the motion says.
The plaintiffs, including the SPLC and the ACLU of Florida, have argued that the city’s redistricting maps represent a violation of the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause. In turn, the city alleges that trying to churn out new maps under the court’s deadline may cause voter confusion and undermine the electorate’s confidence in the voting system.
Jacksonville officials want the district court’s deadline stayed while they pursue an appeal with the 11th Circuit.