By Jeff Wice, Alexis Marking, & Jennifer Hutz.
This week- NYS Voting Rights Act Stricken; Election Turnout, Louisiana Redistricting
N.Y. VOTING RIGHTS ACT LITIGATION
New York Voting Rights Act Struck Down in Clarke v. Newburgh (Orange County)
The New York Voting Rights Act (NYVRA) was struck down in a decision from the Orange County Supreme Court. In January, three Black and three Hispanic residents of Newburgh filed this lawsuit. The residents alleged that the town’s at-large election system for Town Board elections has prevented Black and Hispanic residents from electing candidates of their choice.
The lawsuit was filed under the NYVRA for a violation of § 17-206(2)(b)(i), which addresses instances of voter dilution. On September 25th, the defendants (the Town of Newburgh and the Town Board of Newburgh) filed for summary judgment.
On November 7th, the court ruled that the NYVRA violated the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment and granted the defendants’ motion. When race or national origin is the basis for unequal treatment by a state, the state (here, the NYVRA) must satisfy the “strict scrutiny.” In order to satisfy strict scrutiny, the NYVRA must be shown to serve both a “compelling state interest” and be “narrowly tailored.” The court ruled that the NYVRA did not satisfy these requirements and thus must be “struck in its entirety.”
On November 8th, attorneys for the plaintiffs filed a letter with the judge to seek clarification on whether the decision struck down § 17-206(2)(b)(i) or the entirety of the NYVRA. The case only related to that subsection, but the language of the decision seemed to strike it in its entirety. On November 8th, the New York State Attorney General submitted a letter with the judge seeking to clarify the same issue.
On November 11th, the plaintiffs filed a notice of appeal to the New York Appellate Division, Second Judicial Department.
The defendants in Coads et al. v. Nassau County, NY Communities for Change v. Nassau County, and Serratto et al. v. Town of Mount Pleasant (Westchester County) have filed letters to inform the courts about this decision. The Town of Mount Pleasant has further requested that the court dismiss the action.
ELECTIONS
New York State 2024 Election Turn Out Results
Nearly 8 million voters cast ballots in New York State for President. Kamala Harris won New York by 900k; however, President-elect Donald Trump gained ground in New York from 2020, with 178,000 more votes than he received against Joe Biden in 2020.
Harris won 55% of the vote to Trump’s 43%, compared to Biden’s 61% to Trump’s 38%. Although 2024 New York State voter turnout was lower than it was in 2020, 57.69% of eligible voters cast their ballots, in line with 2016 turnout and is still one of the highest in decades.
The entire country moved more towards Trump in this election, including New York; but low turnout by Democrats is more to blame for the shift in New York. Democrats lost more voters than Republicans gained in 2024, giving a misleading impression that there was a big of a jump towards Republicans. That said, Trump made a 5% gain in Manhattan, 6% in Brooklyn, 11% in both the Bronx and Queens, and 8% in already Republican-leaning Staten Island”. Five counties from Long Island and rural upstate moved from Democrat to Republican in 2024: Rockland, Nassau, Clinton, Broome and Essex.
Of the counties that flipped to red, Democrats still won congressional seats in Nassau County (NY-4), where Democrat Laura Gillen defeated Republican incumbent Anthony D’Esposito; and in Broome County (NY-19), Democrat Josh Riley defeated Republican incumbent Marc Molinaro.
New York is still a Democratic Party stronghold, but the margins were smaller than they have been in decades.
AROUND THE NATION
LOUISIANA: The U.S. Supreme Court will hear two cases (which were consolidated into one) regarding Louisiana’s new congressional map.
In January, a group of twelve “non-African American” voters filed a lawsuit to challenge the state’s new congressional map, which included two majority-Black districts. This map had been drawn in response to a prior lawsuit, in which federal courts determined that the previous map violated Section 2 of the federal Voting Rights Act. As a result, the legislature was ordered to draw a map with a second majority-Black district.
This group of twelve voters alleged that the new map was unconstitutional for violating the 14th and 15th Amendments because race was used as a “predominant factor” when drawing it. A federal district court agreed and struck down the map in April, stating that the legislature must enact a new map by June or an interim map would be used instead.
Louisiana stated that the congressional map needed to be finalized by mid-May. The state submitted an emergency appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court asking for the district court’s order to be temporarily paused until after the 2024 election. The Court agreed and allowed the congressional map with two majority-Black districts to be used.
The Court will now hear the case and determine whether this map is constitutional. A decision is expected by next summer.
INSTITUTE RESOURCES
The New York Elections, Census and Redistricting Institute has archived many resources for the public to view on our Digital Commons Page.
Our Redistricting Resources page contains resources on the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act. You can access the page
here: https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/redistricting_resources/
Archived Updates can be accessed
here: https://digitalcommons.nyls.edu/redistricting_roundtable_updates/
Please share this weekly update with your colleagues. To be added to the mailing list, please contact Jeffrey.wice@nyls.edu
The N.Y. Elections, Census & Redistricting Institute is supported by grants from the New York Community Trust, New York Census Equity Fund, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, and the New York City Council. This report was prepared by Jeff Wice, Alexis Marking, & Jennifer Hutz.