{"id":4909,"date":"2023-08-13T05:03:10","date_gmt":"2023-08-13T05:03:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=4909"},"modified":"2023-08-13T19:01:09","modified_gmt":"2023-08-13T19:01:09","slug":"critics-question-wisconsin-redistricting-lawsuits-request-for-new-senate-elections","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=4909","title":{"rendered":"Critics Question Wisconsin Redistricting Lawsuit\u2019s Request for New Senate Elections"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/wisconsindailystar.com\/news\/critics-question-wisconsin-redistricting-lawsuits-request-for-new-senate-elections\/tcsquare\/2023\/08\/13\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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by Benjamin Yount<\/h5>\n

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Critics of a recent lawsuit filed to force new representative maps believe forcing the 17 state senators elected by using those maps to run again is going too far.<\/p>\n

The suit filed last week with the Wisconsin Supreme Court asks the court to not only draw new maps for the 2024 election, but also have those 17 state senators elected last year to run again next year.<\/p>\n

\u201cReasonable people might have disagreements on what the maps should look like. But to say \u2018we want to kick people out of office\u2019 who were elected 10 months ago, and completely disenfranchise everybody who voted for those 17 senators is breathtaking,\u201d Scott Manley, executive vice president of government relations for Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce told The Center Square.<\/p>\n

Manley (pictured above) said the groups driving the redistricting lawsuit are asking for a writ of quo warranto<\/a>, which the Wisconsin Constitution defines as the \u201cright to any office\u201d and illegal votes.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re using this rather obscure provision of law that allows a court to remove somebody from office because they have unlawfully usurped that office from another person,\u201d Manley said. \u201cThink, for example, of someone who lost an election but refuses to leave. That would be what you\u2019d use a writ of quo warranto to deal with.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lawsuit says Wisconsin\u2019s current political maps are unconstitutional because they retaliate against some voters based on politics and violate Wisconsin\u2019s promise of a free government.<\/p>\n

Sen. Mark Spreitzer, D-Beloit, is one of the senators who would have to run again next year. He said the idea of new elections sounds fair to him.<\/p>\n

\u201cWisconsin should have had fair maps last year, but now we have a chance to have fair maps in 2024. Last November, I was elected to a four-year term, and I will continue to work hard to represent the constituents who elected me until the next election,\u201d Spreitzer said in a statement. \u201cHowever, it is only fair for the entire legislature \u2013 including the 15th Senate District \u2013 to be up for election next year, so that voters will have the opportunity to elect the legislators of their choice on fair maps.\u201d<\/p>\n

Manley said the Democrats who may have to run again are all in safe districts, but many of the Republican state senators are not.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf [Democrats] think that they can get a Senate majority by going through a redistricting map exercise with the court, they don\u2019t want to have to wait until the senators elected in 2022 are up for reelection in 2026.\u201d<\/p>\n

But outside of politics, Manley said there is a constitutional quandary raised by the move to invalidate the 2022 senate elections.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe State Senate is a body comprised of 33 senators. If you remove 17 of them, you\u2019re only left with 16. A quorum is 17,\u201d Manley said. \u201cThey would be robbing the people of Wisconsin of the State Senate to do the people\u2019s business.\u201d<\/p>\n

The groups pushing the lawsuit have asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court to take the case directly. There\u2019s no word when a decision on that request could come.<\/p>\n

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Benjamin Yount is a contributor to The Center Square. <\/a>
\nPhoto \u201cScott Manley\u201d by Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce.<\/a>
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

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The post Critics Question Wisconsin Redistricting Lawsuit\u2019s Request for New Senate Elections<\/a> appeared first on The Wisconsin Daily Star<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/wisconsindailystar.com\/news\/critics-question-wisconsin-redistricting-lawsuits-request-for-new-senate-elections\/tcsquare\/2023\/08\/13\/ by Benjamin Yount \u00a0 Critics of a recent lawsuit…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":3495,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wi-daily-star"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4909"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4909\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4910,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4909\/revisions\/4910"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3495"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}