Senate Minority Leader Dan McConchie (left) and House Minority Leader Jim Durkin are pictured in a virtual news conference earlier this year. The two leaders filed a lawsuit this week challenging the new legislative maps passed by Democrats and signed into law by Gov. JB Pritzker last week.
Republican leaders in the Illinois House and Senate filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday challenging the constitutionality of the new legislative district maps that Gov. JB Pritzker signed into law June 4.
Senate Minority Leader Dan McConchie, of Hawthorn Woods, and House Minority Leader Jim Durkin, of Western Springs, filed the suit in U.S. District Court in Chicago, arguing that the maps are based on survey data rather than official U.S. Census numbers and therefore violate the U.S. Constitution’s “one person, one vote” requirement.
Justin L. Fowler/The State Journal-Register via AP file
Republicans took the Democrats and state election officials to court Wednesday over the new legislative maps, filing a federal lawsuit that argues the boundaries signed into law by Gov. J.B. Pritzker are unconstitutional because they are not based on actual U.S. census population figures.
State House Republican Leader Jim Durkin of Western Springs and Senate GOP Leader Dan McConchie of Hawthorn Woods name House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch, Senate President Don Harmon, members of theirs staffs and the Illinois State Board of Elections in the suit.
“The tone-deaf Democratic party of Illinois has robbed citizens of a fair and transparent legislative map-making process, and I plan to be a conduit for Illinois citizens who demand honesty by ensuring they also have their day in court,” Durkin said in a statement.
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Illinois’ Republican legislative leaders filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday seeking to overturn redistricting maps drawn by Democrats, contending the party’s reliance on population estimates is “arbitrary” and “discriminatory” and violates the U.S. Constitution.
New legislative maps for the Illinois House and Senate would unfairly deny minority voters and other citizens their ability to influence elections, Republican leaders in the General Assembly say in a federal lawsuit challenging the maps.
House Minority Leader Jim Durkin, R-Western Springs, and Senate Minority Leader Dan McConchie, R-Hawthorn Woods, filed the widely expected lawsuit Wednesday in Chicago with the Eastern Division of the U.S. District Court’s Northern District of Illinois.
If successful, leaders of Republicans in chambers where Democrats hold super-majorities could see a court transfer redistricting authority from the legislature to a bipartisan commission that would give Republicans a 50-50 chance of controlling the once-every-10-years remap process.