Malliotakis Seeks Supreme Court Help on Redistricting
Representative Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.) has requested the U.S. Supreme Court’s intervention to shield New York’s only Republican-held House seat from what she describes as a “baseless” legal challenge aimed at redistricting ahead of the midterms.
In an emergency motion submitted Friday to Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Malliotakis’ legal team asserted that the lower court’s decision to invalidate the current 11th Congressional District map is unconstitutional.
“The trial court’s order has thrown New York state elections into chaos on the eve of the 2026 Congressional elections,” the filing stated.
Her request seeks an immediate halt before the midterm election season kicks off in just two weeks.
As the clock counts down to February 24, when nomination petitions are set to begin circulating, lawyers expressed concerns about the ongoing legal uncertainty, terming it “unmapped, uncertain, and a recipe for unconstitutional confusion.”
This significant appeal follows a ruling by a Manhattan judge declaring the existing map, which connects Staten Island to lower Brooklyn, “unconstitutional.”
Judge Jeffrey Perlman, formerly part of Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul’s team, indicated that he mandated new maps to enhance the representation of minority voters and avert “unlawful vote dilution.”
Malliotakis’ attorneys criticized this ruling as a substantial shift from past practices, highlighting that the district has kept largely the same boundaries since the 1980s and has had representation from both parties over the last decade.
The timing of the filing with the nation’s top court is somewhat unusual, as the original case is still progressing through the state appeals process.
The New York Court of Appeals, the highest court in the state, recently dismissed the stay request, citing lack of jurisdiction and returning the case to the lower appellate division.
Attorneys from Elias Law Group, a Democratic group involved, remarked that the Supreme Court application was a “hopeless appeal” that was “premature and inappropriate.”
The emergency filing aims to address these concerns by hoping that the state appellate court will “put an end to this unconstitutional mischief,” while simultaneously asking the Supreme Court to intervene by February 24 “if the appellate court does not.”
Malliotakis voiced her dissent regarding the situation, stating, “The U.S. Supreme Court has made clear that racially motivated redistricting violates the U.S. Constitution.”
She added, “The Washington Democrats who filed this sham lawsuit are attempting to manipulate our electoral and judicial processes by blocking an unconstitutional order right before petitions are collected in order to prevent this case from being fully appealed.”
