NY Redistricting Maps Tossed By State's Appeals Court

NEW YORK CITY — A controversial congressional redistricting that would have benefited Democrats got scrapped by New York's top appeals court.

The opinion released Wednesday effectively will bring congressional and state senate maps back to the drawing board.

And Democrats — who faced accusations they gerrymandered districts — won't be doing it this. Instead, a neutral expert will be designated a "special master" and draw up new district lines.

This likely will mean congressional and state Senate primaries could be delayed from their current June 28 date in order to give time for the maps to be redrawn.

"Although it will likely be necessary to move the congressional and senate primary elections to August, New York routinely held a bifurcated primary until recently, with some primaries occurring as late as September," the opinion states.

The redistricting opinion's impact on New York City could be enormous.

State Democrats had ignored maps drawn by an independent commission in favor of districts that were widely seen as favoring their candidates.

Perhaps no district was more emblematic of that than the 11th District, which was redrawn to fold Park Slope and other Brooklyn Democratic strongholds into the heavily Republican seat in Staten Island held by Rep. Nicole Malliotakis.

The opinion didn't affect the state's Assembly maps, which weren't contested. How the decision will affect that primary is unclear, but it seems it could go ahead in June while the congressional and state Senate ones are delayed.

Read the full opinion here.