DETROIT — A federal three-judge panel on Friday dismissed part of a lawsuit brought by several Michigan Republicans in an effort to overturn the congressional voting district map drawn and adopted by the Michigan Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission.
Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Raymond Kethledge wrote that the plaintiffs' claims of unfair communities of interest in the new map is simply "a political-gerrymandering claim by another name" and not under the purview of the court.
"The term’s vagueness affords the commission broad discretion to define the term however it likes," Kethledge wrote of the Michigan Constitution's inclusion of "communities of interest."
