ALBANY, N.Y. — A judge’s decision to toss out the boundaries of the only Republican-held congressional district in New York City could help Democrats notch a win in the national redistricting wars – but for now, the outcome remains uncertain.
The judge ordered new lines be drawn, and fast, with party primaries just five months away. But experts say that is no simple task, and the Republicans have promised a legal appeal. The final shape of the district currently held by U.S. Rep. Nicole Malliotakis could be unknown for some time.
“In one word: chaos,” said Blair Horner of the New York Public Interest Research Group when asked to characterize the situation.
Yet it is clear that the ruling creates an opportunity for Democrats.
The lawsuit that led to the judge’s decision, filed by an election law firm aligned with the Democratic Party, suggested reshaping Malliotakis’ suburban Staten Island district to reach across the water to include sections of Manhattan – the luxury apartments of Tribeca, the once-bohemian West Village and the upscale shopping district of SoHo.
The result would be a much more liberal district, much easier for a Democrat to win this fall as both parties battle for control of the House.
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Malliotakis has called it an attempt by Democrats to “tilt the scale to give their party an advantage.”
But it will be up to a redistricting commission to draw the new lines – and that is if an appeals court doesn’t put a stop to it first.
The lawsuit was brought as part of a national gerrymandering fight that began after President Donald Trump pushed to craft new congressional districts in Republican-controlled states like Texas that could help his party hold onto its narrow U.S. House majority.
Justice Jeffrey Pearlman on Wednesday threw out the boundaries of the current district, saying its composition, which includes all of Staten Island and a small bit of Brooklyn, unconstitutionally dilutes the votes of Black and Hispanic residents. The judge wrote that the current district lines “are a contributing factor in the lack of representation for minority voters.”
As part of the ruling, he directed the state’s Independent Redistricting Commission to complete a new congressional map by Feb. 6. Pearlman said he imposed the tight deadline at the request of state election officials. The petition process for candidates starts at the end of February.
The ruling gave the commission, which includes appointees of Democratic and Republican leaders in the state Legislature, only 16 days to complete a politically sensitive task that would alter the boundaries of multiple districts.
A co-executive director of the redistricting commission released a statement saying that while meeting the court’s deadline would be a challenge, “we are ready to do so.”
But Republicans said they would appeal, which could result in a hold on Pearlman’s order until higher courts consider the case.
“This is a political gerrymander masquerading as a voting rights case,” said John Faso, a former Republican congressman involved his party’s redistricting efforts.
The case could ultimately land before New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, which has ruled on redistricting in the past. In 2022, the top court rejected new congressional maps that had widely been seen as favoring Democrats and directed a court-appointed experts to redraw district lines, only to throw out those redrawn maps again 20 months later.
It is unclear if the redistricting commission can even complete a new map in mere weeks. It has failed to reach agreements in the past, and the Democrat-controlled legislature can reject the panel’s proposals in order to tweak the lines in their favor. Horner noted the commission, with its split of Republicans and Democrats, is essentially “designed for gridlock” on controversial issues.
“It’s doable,” said Jeffrey Wice, professor at New York Law School. “The question is whether it’s possible in the time frame given.”
The judge rejected the lawsuit’s proposal to reconfigure the district, saying the state constitution left that decision to the Independent Redistricting Commission.
But if Democrats get their way, they would likely take the chunk of southern Brooklyn that Malliotakis currently represents – which is physically and culturally close to Staten Island – and put it into an adjoining district that would stretch from the bottom of Brooklyn all the way into Manhattan’s Chinatown.
U.S. Rep. Dan Goldman, a Democrat whose lower Manhattan and Brooklyn district would be upended under the proposed new lines, appears open to the change, as long as it helps his party win the House.
“Our top priority must be to retake the majority and make Hakeem Jeffries Speaker of the House, and I will always place that goal first,” he said in a statement.
Staten Island has mostly been represented in Congress by Republicans since the 1980s, through there have been exceptions. Democrat Max Rose represented the district for one term before being ousted by Malliotakis in 2020. In 2024, Malliotakis beat her Democratic opponent by 28 points.
