SCOTUS on course to protect gerrymandering from legal challenges

Quote:

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to consider protecting politically gerrymandered voting districts from legal challenges in a case that could bolster Republican candidates and mark a show of force from the court’s new conservative majority. The justices will review separate lower court decisions that said North Carolina’s Republican-drawn congressional map and a Democratic-drawn congressional district in Maryland are so partisan they violate the Constitution. The court will hear arguments in March and rule by June. The court has never struck down a map as too partisan. But it also hasn’t explicitly barred challenges, mostly because Justice Anthony Kennedy refused to rule them out. Kennedy’s retirement in 2018 -- and replacement by Justice Brett Kavanaugh -- means the court may now have the five votes needed to say that courts lack power to consider partisan gerrymandering cases.

Linky.

Of course, they (Roberts) could still punt, like they did on the last gerrymandering cases.