Missouri’s congressional map has been the subject of bitter court fights since Republican legislators redrew the lines last year to boost their party’s odds in the midterm elections.
A dizzying volley of court rulings in recent days has created widespread confusion about which boundaries will be in effect in November and about how long any single decision on the matter might hold.
Three courts weighed in on the issue on Thursday, leaving the state of play for the general election in November somewhat clearer and renewing Democrats’ hope of holding a seat that could help determine control of Congress.
Here’s what to know about how we got here and what might happen next:
The U.S. Supreme Court stepped in. Again.
For the second time in a week, the Supreme Court issued a decision that prevented Missouri from using the new map.
The latest order left in place a Missouri Supreme Court ruling that instructed election officials to use the lines that had been in force since 2022 this November. The primary election last month was held using the redrawn boundaries.
Missouri’s top election official, Secretary of State Denny Hoskins, said he would comply with the order.
The court’s order and Mr. Hoskins’s pledge to abide by it represented a significant win for Democrats and a blow to the Republicans who redrew the lines at President Trump’s request.
What does this mean for the November election?
If no additional courts intervene, Democrats would be favored to retain a Kansas City-area House seat that Republicans had hoped to flip. The state’s U.S. House delegation is likely to continue to include six Republicans and two Democrats.
But even after what might have appeared to be decisive rulings from the U.S. Supreme Court, more court fights seem likely.
On Thursday, after the U.S. Supreme Court announced its decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit scheduled oral arguments for next week in a case filed by a Republican congressman and a Republican candidate for Congress who want the redrawn lines to be used in the general election. But any further ruling in that case would not take effect without additional action from the U.S. Supreme Court.
There is little precedent for holding a general election with different district lines from those used in a primary, and no court has specified how Missouri’s nominees should be selected. It seems likeliest that the candidates who won their primaries under the redrawn map would remain the nominees in the same-numbered districts on the old map.
Even as the secretary of state’s office instructed county election officials on Thursday to prepare for the November election using the older lines, Republicans signaled that they would not drop the issue.
“I look forward to the Eighth Circuit’s consideration of the merits of the Missouri First Map and remain confident in the legal process moving forward,” Gov. Mike Kehoe said on Thursday, referring to the redrawn map.
What did the new map do?
Missouri was one of the first states to join Mr. Trump’s redistricting push last year. The new map sliced the core of Kansas City, Missouri’s largest city, into several districts, placing Democratic-leaning urban voters in squiggly-lined districts that stretched well into the state’s conservative countryside.
The new map would likely have ended the congressional career of Representative Emanuel Cleaver, an 11-term Democrat from Kansas City who was also the city’s first Black mayor, and delivered his seat to a Republican. In a close election nationally, that seat could help swing partisan control of Congress. Mr. Cleaver is seeking re-election.
Even if the older lines are used in November, the redrawn boundaries could still eventually take effect. Because hundreds of thousands of Missourians signed petitions seeking a statewide vote on the new map, the State Supreme Court said the new lines would be suspended until voters weighed in. That vote will take place in November.
What’s the latest out of the Missouri Supreme Court?
Missouri’s highest court found that Mr. Hoskins had been in civil contempt for not moving quickly enough to implement its order to return to the older map. But because Mr. Hoskins reversed course on Thursday, the court said he was no longer in contempt and took no further action against him.
Until the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on Thursday, Mr. Hoskins had said he planned to follow a federal district judge’s order to use the new map instead of the unanimous State Supreme Court order to return to the older lines. Five of the seven Missouri Supreme Court judges were appointed by Republican governors.
In a hearing on Thursday that started just minutes after the U.S. Supreme Court issued its order, many of the Missouri judges were visibly frustrated as a lawyer for Mr. Hoskins said the state was “evaluating next steps” and did not promise to return to the older lines.
“We’re in a precarious situation,” Chief Justice W. Brent Powell said, adding that he was trying to “save some of these elections so that they are valid” and so that Missouri’s next congressional delegation could be seated.
Ann E. Marimow and Bernard Mokam contributed reporting.
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