Senate Republicans try to stop messy Montana primary

Senate GOP leaders got their dream recruit in Montana. Now they have to work to keep their 2018 loser out.

The race to take on Sen. Jon Tester, one of the most vulnerable Democrats on the ballot next year, kicked off Tuesday with a campaign launch by Tim Sheehy, a Navy SEAL-turned-aerial firefighter.

Within a day he had secured the support of the chair of the Senate GOP campaign arm and endorsements from three other senators — a clear show of force aimed at spooking Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-Mont.), a likely primary rival, out of running.

“It’s great to see so many conservative senators rallying around Tim’s candidacy,” Montana Sen. Steve Daines told POLITICO, taking the unusual step of trying to gently but publicly nudge the congressmember out of the way. “I really like Matt Rosendale, which is why I am encouraging him to build seniority for the great state of Montana in the House and help Republicans hold their majority.”

That move by Daines, the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, indicates just how eager top Republicans are to ward off Rosendale and a messy primary. Sens. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) threw their support behind Sheehy on Tuesday. A day later, Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) endorsed him, praising his “courage and integrity” and his “remarkable career.”

A member of the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus, Rosendale has privately told lawmakers he plans to make another run against Tester after failing to beat the incumbent five years ago. His lackluster fundraising and bruising past loss have left party strategists and donors nervous that Rosendale would struggle to win a general election in a state that is crucial to the GOP’s path to the majority.

Rosendale has taken no formal steps toward a campaign. But on Tuesday he appeared undeterred, taking a shot at Sheehy and yoking him to the Senate minority leader.

“Congratulations to Mitch McConnell and the party bosses on getting their chosen candidate,” he tweeted. “Now Washington has two candidates — Tim Sheehy and Jon Tester — who will protect the DC cartel.”

Conservatives in the Senate, including Mike Lee of Utah and Ted Cruz of Texas, have encouraged Rosendale to enter. And the anti-tax Club for Growth, an influential GOP outside group, has signaled it would likely back Rosendale again. The Club’s thinking has not changed since Sheehy’s entrance, according to a person close to the group, granted anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss internal planning.

Rosendale lost to Tester by more than 3 points in 2018 after struggling to match the senator’s fundraising and brush off questions about his Montana roots. He raised just $6 million that cycle compared with Tester’s $23.3 million.

Some Montana donors allied with Sheehy are urging Rosendale not to challenge him. Their message has often taken the same tone as Daines’: They like Rosendale and hope he will continue his work in the House. They don’t want him to complicate their ability to win a Senate seat.

“I think the path forward to be effective across all elections is with Tim in the Senate seat,” said Eugene Graf IV, an influential donor in Montana who supported Rosendale in 2018 but is backing Sheehy this cycle. He said he thought Sheehy’s candidacy would “cause Matt to pause and think about that future.”

“Unfortunately, there’s some personalities that see a path for them instead of maybe the big picture for the state or for the country,” Graf said.

In response to those urging Rosendale to remain in the House, a Rosendale spokesperson, Aashka Varma, also pointed to a February poll commissioned by the congressmember’s campaign that showed him up 5 points over Tester and a Public Policy Polling survey that showed him with a 54-point lead over Sheehy in the primary.

“This is an attempt by McConnell and the DC cartel to dismiss the voters of Montana,” Varma said in a statement. “Rep. Rosendale has the trust and overwhelming support of Montana voters.”

Still, some supporters of Sheehy, who want to see Rosendale remain in Congress, are wary of donating to the congressmember out of concern that he would spend those funds against other Republicans.

“I personally won’t give Matt money until I know that my money is not going to be used to battle Tim,” said Brian Cebull, a Montana donor and businessman involved in the oil and gas industry.

When asked in a Wednesday morning TV interview, Sheehy also addressed Rosendale’s prospective candidacy.

“Matt’s obviously our House representative, and I hope he continues to do his good work there,” Sheehy said, “I hope it stays that way, but I can’t predict what’s going to happen.”

Sheehy is personally wealthy and is expected to invest heavily in his own campaign. He has seen some donor enthusiasm since his launch Tuesday. He easily outraised Rosendale’s first-quarter haul of $127,000, without self-funding, in less than 24 hours after announcing a run, according to a person close to the Sheehy campaign who was not authorized to disclose fundraising details.

But if Sheehy can outpace Rosendale’s finances, he may not escape carpetbagging attacks from Tester allies. Sheehy moved to Montana after leaving the Navy to start a business. He will also have work to become known among voters in the state. He is a political neophyte, which means he has no record to attack but also no base of support among the electorate.

Rosendale served for years in the Montana Legislature and as the state’s auditor before waging campaigns for the House and the Senate. His multiple statewide runs will likely give him a head start in any primary campaign.

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Lowell P. Weicker Jr. maverick senator during Watergate dies at 92

HARTFORD, Conn. — Lowell P. Weicker Jr., a Republican U.S. senator who tussled with his own party during the Watergate hearings, championed legislation to protect people with disabilities and later was elected Connecticut governor as an independent, died Wednesday. He was 92.

Weicker’s death at a hospital in Middletown, Conn., after a short illness, was confirmed by his family in a statement released by a spokesperson.

With a 6-foot-6-inch frame and a shoot-from-the-hip style, Weicker was a leading figure in Connecticut politics from his first election to the General Assembly in 1962 until he decided against running for a second term as governor in 1994.

He inspired strong feelings among many people he met. In one poll, opinion was split over whether Weicker was “decisive and courageous,” or “inflexible and arrogant.”

“I think he was just incredibly genuine, a little unfiltered,” Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont, a Democrat who considered Weicker a friend, told the Associated Press in 2021. “And we sort of miss that in this day and age with the teleprompter.”

Elected in 1990 to his single term as governor, Weicker restructured Connecticut’s revenue system, shepherding in a new income tax despite vocal opposition. He also helped craft a compact with the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation which ultimately brought casino gambling to eastern Connecticut.

“He was a leader who constantly challenged the status quo. He didn’t want to win any popularity contests,” said Republican state Sen. Ryan Fazio, who represents Greenwich, the town where Weicker once served as first selectman. Such independent mindedness was praised Wednesday by Republicans like Fazio as well as Democrats, who control state government and the state’s congressional delegation.

“He did immense good for Connecticut and our country, and he did it his way,” said Democratic U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal. Former Democratic Gov. Dannel P. Malloy praised Weicker for being “tough and compassionate at the same time.”

Nationally, Weicker’s political marquee burned brightest during the 1973 hearings of the Senate’s special committee on Watergate. One of three Republicans on the seven-member panel, the freshman senator was not afraid to criticize President Richard Nixon, his own party or the attempted cover-up.

In his 1995 autobiography “Maverick: A Life in Politics,” Weicker said he didn’t volunteer for a spot on the committee to be an “anti-Nixon man,” or a “tough prosecutor,” acknowledging that he supported Nixon politically and how Nixon campaigned for him in 1968 and 1970.

“More and more, events were making it clear that the Nixon White House was a cauldron of corruption,” Weicker wrote. “And even as disclosures kept coming, more and more national leaders were acting as though nothing especially unusual had happened.”

Barry Sussman, a former Washington Post editor who worked with Weicker on his autobiography, credited Weicker with taking the Watergate scandal more seriously than his Senate colleagues and for investigating whether Nixon underreported his income.

“None of the other Republican senators had any interest in doing any probing, period,” Sussman said. “That was basically true of the Democrats, too.”

Weicker was born in Paris in 1931, to Lowell P. Weicker Sr. — whose family founded the pharmaceutical giant E.R. Squibb and Sons — and the former Mary Bickford, a daughter of a prominent British family.

After college, law school and service in the Army, Weicker was elected to the Connecticut House of Representatives in 1962 and served three terms. His national political career began in 1968 with election to the U.S. House of Representatives. Two years later, he moved up to the U.S. Senate.

Besides serving on the Watergate committee, Weicker worked for passage of the War Powers Act. The father of a child with developmental disabilities, he sponsored the Protection and Advocacy for the Mentally Ill Act in 1985 and 1988 and introduced legislation that would later become the Americans with Disabilities Act.

But Weicker was at odds with the conservative wing of his party on social issues such as school prayer, busing and abortion.

Irritated Republicans in 1988 backed then-Democrat Joe Lieberman and denied Weicker a fourth term in the Senate. But two years later, he was back in politics with a new affiliation. He won the governor’s office, sworn in as the state’s first — and last — independent governor since the Civil War, heading a new independent political party called A Connecticut Party.

When he took office, Connecticut’s budget deficit was $963 million. During the 1990 campaign, Weicker opposed instituting a personal state income tax, saying it would be like “pouring gasoline on a fire.” But his budget secretary convinced him the tax was the only fiscally responsible choice.

Weicker vetoed three state budgets passed by legislators until he got his way. On Aug. 22, 1991, lawmakers finally passed a budget with a 4.5 percent flat income tax and a reduction in the sales tax from 8 to 6 percent, coupled with spending cuts.

An estimated 40,000 protesters packed the state Capitol grounds in Hartford on Oct. 5, 1991, demanding lawmakers “axe the tax.” Some hanged him in effigy. Meanwhile, others, including furloughed state workers, protested Weicker’s budget cuts. A nun said she would “pray that he burns forever in the fires of hell” for trying to slash state aid to parochial schools.

Weicker’s favorability rating plummeted but the income tax prevailed and the state ended the 1992 fiscal year with a $110 million surplus.

The John F. Kennedy Library Foundation awarded Weicker a Profiles in Courage Award in 1992.

He said his decision against seeking a second term was a matter of family and money, not politics. Weicker said he wanted to spend more time with his third wife, Claudia Testa, his seven children and his grandchildren. He said he also wanted to make more money than the governor’s annual salary at the time, $78,000.

Weicker considered running for president as an independent in 1996 and was back in the spotlight in 1999 when former wrestler and Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura encouraged Weicker to run for the Reform Party nomination. Weicker turned him down

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Debris from implosion of Titanic-bound submersible is returned to land

PORTLAND, Maine — Debris from the Titan submersible has been returned to land after a fatal implosion during its voyage to the wreck of the Titanic captured the world’s attention last week.

The return of the debris to port in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, is a key piece of the investigation into why the submersible imploded, killing all five people on board. Twisted chunks of the 22-foot submersible were unloaded at a Canadian Coast Guard pier Wednesday.

The Canadian ship Horizon Arctic carried a remotely operated vehicle, or ROV, to search the ocean floor near the Titanic wreck for pieces of the submersible. Pelagic Research Services, a company with offices in Massachusetts and New York that owns the ROV, said Wednesday that it has completed offshore operations.

Pelagic Research Services’ team is “still on mission” and cannot comment on the ongoing Titan investigation, which involves several government agencies in the U.S. and Canada, said Jeff Mahoney, a spokesperson for the company.

“They have been working around the clock now for 10 days, through the physical and mental challenges of this operation, and are anxious to finish the mission and return to their loved ones,” Mahoney said.

Debris from the Titan was located about 12,500 feet underwater and roughly 1,600 feet from the Titanic on the ocean floor, the Coast Guard said last week. The Coast Guard is leading the investigation into why the submersible imploded during its June 18 descent. Officials announced on June 22 that the submersible had imploded and all five people on board were dead.

The Coast Guard has convened a Marine Board of Investigation into the implosion. That is the highest level of investigation conducted by the Coast Guard.

One of the experts the Coast Guard consulted with during the search said analyzing the physical material of recovered debris could reveal important clues about what happened to the Titan. And there could be electronic data, said Carl Hartsfield of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

“Certainly all the instruments on any deep sea vehicle, they record data. They pass up data. So the question is, is there any data available? And I really don’t know the answer to that question,” he said Monday.

Representatives for Horizon Arctic did not respond to requests for comment.

Coast Guard representatives declined to comment on the investigation or the return of debris to shore Wednesday. No bodies have been recovered, though Coast Guard officials said days earlier that they were taking precautions in case they encountered human remains during the investigation.

OceanGate CEO and pilot Stockton Rush was killed in the implosion along with two members of a prominent Pakistani family, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood; British adventurer Hamish Harding; and Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet.

Representatives for the National Transportation Safety Board and Transportation Safety Board of Canada, which are both involved in the investigation, also declined to comment. The National Transportation Safety Board has said the Coast Guard has declared the loss of the Titan submersible to be a “major marine casualty” and the Coast Guard will lead the investigation.

“We are not able to provide any additional information at this time as the investigation is ongoing,” said Liam MacDonald, a spokesperson for the Transportation Safety Board of Canada.

A spokesperson for the International Maritime Organization, the U.N.’s maritime agency, has said any investigative reports from the disaster would be submitted for review. Member states of the IMO can also propose changes such as stronger regulations of submersibles.

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Americans remain divided on gun control as national worry over violence rises Pew report finds

As gun-related death rates continue to rise each year in the U.S., a new Pew Research study found that while views about gun ownership and gun policy remain starkly divided along party lines, Americans across the political spectrum increasingly see gun violence and violent crime as issues of national concern.

Democrats and Republicans agree on little when it comes to gun ownership and gun policies, according to the report released Wednesday. Seventy-nine percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents surveyed said they believe that gun ownership increases safety; nearly the same percentage of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents said the opposite. Only one policy proposal, restrictions on gun purchases for people with mental illnesses, received bipartisan support in the Pew study.

Despite these differences, 60 percent of Americans surveyed said they believe gun violence is a ‘very big’ national issue, up seven percentage points from 2018. Americans in both parties are also increasingly concerned about violent crime; 59 percent of Americans see violent crime as a ‘very big’ national issue, up seven percentage points from 2018, according to the report. Over 60 percent of Americans said they believe that gun violence will increase in the next five years; just seven percent believe it will decrease during that time period.

Concerns among Democrats and Republicans about crime have increased similarly. Fifty-two percent of Democrats and 64 percent of Republicans view crime as a ‘very big’ national issue, up eight and 12 percentage points from 2021 respectively.

Meanwhile, concerns about gun violence are up 11 points among both Republicans and Democrats. That said, an over 40-point gap still exists between the two parties’ voters on the issue; 81 percent of Democrats view gun violence as a ‘very big’ issue as opposed to just 38 percent of Republicans.

The data from Pew comes as violent crime remains a critical talking point for Republicans on the campaign trail, and as the number of mass shootings and gun-related homicides and suicides continues to increase in the wake of the pandemic. FBI data from 2021, the most recently available year for crime data, noted that 61 mass shootings occurred that year, and that gun-related homicides and suicides that year were responsible for the deaths of 48,830 Americans.

In response to several high-profile mass shootings, notably the May 2022 shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill negotiated the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which expanded background checks and federal funding for community and mental health initiatives. The bill, which President Joe Biden signed into law in July 2022, was the first major piece of gun control legislation passed in three decades.

However, the White House and Democrats on Capitol Hill have continued to push for further federal gun control measures. In February, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) reintroduced the Background Check Expansion Act. The bill, which faces steep odds in the slimly-Democratic Senate and the Republican-controlled House, would extend federal background checks to cover almost all sales and transfers of firearms between individuals.

Biden has also indicated his desire to take greater action on gun violence, saying in a speech in Connecticut earlier this month that the Safer Communities Act was "an important first step" and that "we are not finished."

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How the Supreme Courts decision on election law could shut the door on future fake electors

The Supreme Court’s rejection of a controversial election theory may also have another huge political consequence for future presidential contests: It obliterated the dubious fake elector scheme that Donald Trump deployed in his failed attempt to seize a second term.

That scheme relied on friendly state legislatures appointing “alternate” slates of pro-Trump presidential electors — even if state laws certified victory for Joe Biden. Backed by fringe theories crafted by attorneys like John Eastman, Trump contended that state legislatures could unilaterally reverse the outcome and override their own laws and constitutions to do so.

Mainstream election lawyers on both sides of the aisle denounced the theory in the months after the 2020 election. But because no court had ever directly ruled on the theory, its proponents were able to describe it as a plausible, if untested, interpretation of constitutional law. Eastman himself, currently facing disbarment in California for his actions to subvert the election, has claimed that he was engaged in “good-faith” advocacy on an unsettled legal question.

But by rejecting the so-called independent state legislature theory in Moore v. Harper on Tuesday, Chief Justice Roberts effectively extinguished it as a plausible path in 2024 and beyond.

“It keeps the toothpaste in the tube, in the sense that the theories that would give state legislatures unvarnished power has been rejected,” said Ben Ginsberg, a prominent Republican elections attorney who loudly pushed back against Trump’s attempts in 2020 to overturn his loss. “State legislatures thinking that they can just, if they feel like it after an election, replace the popular will with a slate of electors is as gone as ‘there can't be any review of redistricting plans.’”

Tuesday’s opinion primarily revolves around an interpretation of the U.S. Constitution’s elections clause, which says that state legislatures can set rules for congressional elections in their states.

Though some on the right have interpreted the clause as giving state legislatures total authority to write and rewrite election procedures, without any input from governors or state courts, the Supreme Court rejected that notion.

That decision cuts the already-wobbly legal legs out from under Trump’s last-ditch efforts to remain in power. When Trump tried to subvert the 2020 election, his allies relied, in part, on a similarly fringe interpretation of the Constitution’s electors clause, which permits state legislatures to determine the method for appointing presidential electors. Eastman and other Trump allies argued that state legislatures could determine unilaterally that Trump was the rightful winner, appointing their own electors to be counted on Jan. 6, 2021.

No state legislatures embraced Eastman’s calls, and the effort collapsed when then-Vice President Mike Pence refused a simultaneous pressure campaign to single-handedly postpone the counting of electoral votes.

Tuesday’s decision contained just glancing discussion of the electors clause in its majority opinion, which was joined by liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson and conservatives Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. But in soundly rejecting the independent state legislature theory, the implications were clear: “The Elections Clause does not insulate state legislatures from the ordinary exercise of state judicial review,” Roberts wrote.

“Today’s ruling makes clear, for example, that an elected state legislature cannot cut the people of the state out of the loop of picking presidential elections if the state constitution requires that electors to the electoral college be popularly selected,” argued Vikram Amar, a law professor at the University of Illinois, on a call organized by the group Protect Democracy and others who opposed the independent state legislature theory.

The elections clause and electors clause contain very similar language. The elections clause reads that the “times, places and manner” of electing senators and representatives “shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof,” while also granting explicit powers to Congress to do the same. The electors clause similarly says each state shall appoint presidential electors “in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.”

“The operative constitutional language in the two clauses is essentially identical,” said Michael Luttig, a former conservative federal appellate judge who advised Pence to reject those alternative slate of electors on Jan. 6.

The clearest link between Tuesday’s decision and the Trump election gambit was in the references to a 140-year-old Supreme Court decision in McPherson v. Blacker — a ruling cited repeatedly by Trump’s allies as they sought to justify their efforts to supplant Biden’s electors with their own.

That 1892 decision paved the way for a Michigan law that permitted the appointment of electors by congressional district, and it emphasized the power of legislatures to dictate the way presidential electors are chosen.

Eastman has repeatedly cited that ruling as evidence that state legislatures could simply ignore state court decisions they disliked regarding the appointment of electors, and he has reupped those arguments as he seeks to hold onto his California law license this month.

Like Eastman, then-DOJ official Jeffrey Clark cited the McPherson decision in a now-infamous letter that he pressed Justice Department leaders to issue on the cusp of Jan. 6, 2021, urging them to call their legislatures into session and consider appointing a new slate of electors. Trump appeared to briefly appoint Clark as acting attorney general amid this battle before rescinding the decision amid a mass resignation threat by top DOJ officials.

Roberts made clear that the McPherson ruling was not a green light for state legislatures to ignore the constraints of state constitutions, laws and courts. In fact, the 19th-Century opinion didn’t address such a conflict.

“Our decision in McPherson … had nothing to do with any conflict between provisions of the Michigan Constitution and action by the State’s legislature — the issue we confront today,” he wrote.

Conversely, the dissent from the Roberts opinion, authored by Justice Clarence — whom Eastman clerked for in 1996 — might provide Eastman a boost in his effort to save his bar license. Eastman has argued that even if his legal theory was wrong, it’s not a punishable offense to give incorrect or unpopular legal advice.

Bar discipline authorities seeking to disbar him, however, say Eastman’s advice was catastrophically wrong and built on assumptions and inferences that no lawyer could make in good faith. They have repeatedly emphasized that Eastman sought to avoid court battles over his theory because they might have resulted in an adverse decision before Jan. 6.

But Thomas’ dissent made clear he endorsed a key aspect of Eastman’s view: that state legislatures are not bound by their own constitutions when it comes to the appointment of electors. Citing McPherson, Thomas rejected Roberts’ interpretation of the case.

“Contrary to the majority’s suggestion of ambiguity … this statement can only have meant that the state legislature’s power to direct the manner of appointing electors may not be limited by the state constitution,” Thomas wrote in a footnote. One other justice — conservative Neil Gorsuch — signed onto that portion of Thomas’ dissent.

Eastman had urged Pence to consider electoral votes purportedly cast by pro-Trump activists in several states that Biden won, even when no state legislatures agreed to endorse a slate of “alternate” electors.

That push has landed Eastman at the center of both bar disciplinary actions as well as ongoing criminal probes in Washington and Georgia.

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Supreme Court ruling supercharges state fights over partisan gerrymandering

The Supreme Court just turbo-charged the nationwide fight over gerrymandering.

It is a rejection of the so-called independent state legislature theory, with the Supreme Court leaving a role for state courts to wade into the increasingly common battles over partisan gerrymandering. State courts have been immensely influential over congressional control over the last half-decade.

The ruling ensures that state Supreme Courts will remain ultimate arbiters of partisan gerrymandering, and that they can rein in legislatures looking to use redistricting to eviscerate a minority party. Previously under the radar judicial contests will continue to see millions of dollars pour in to influence their outcomes.

“There was this real movement into state courts after 2018,” said Marina Jenkins, executive director of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, referring to Democrats’ success in challenging Pennsylvania’s GOP-drawn map before a state court. “If anything, this is just ensuring that those fights can continue, and that a broader landscape of litigation can continue to be pursued.”

Wisconsin Democrats are perhaps the most immediate winners of the decision. Liberals won a majority on their state Supreme Court for the first time in over a decade earlier this year. They are already plotting to use it to unravel what is perhaps the strongest GOP gerrymandering in the country. The independent state legislature theory threatened to upend those plans, so Democrats now have a clearer path to litigate those maps thanks to Tuesday’s ruling.

It also has a major effect on a long-running fight in Ohio, where the state Supreme Court has repeatedly struck down GOP maps there as illegal gerrymanders. Ohio Republicans have asked the nation’s top court to intervene on similar grounds, but the court has not yet acted on their plea. Tuesday’s ruling means the fight will likely remain between the legislature and the state Supreme Court, which became more favorable to Republicans last year.

Meanwhile, Democrats are pushing to have court-drawn lines thrown out in New York, where a particularly aggressive Democratic gerrymander could cost Republicans several seats. While that fight in state court is ongoing, there is no immediate ruling that would give Democrats the green light to immediately ignore their state judiciary.

It will, however, have little effect in North Carolina, the state where Moore v. Harper originated. Republicans there, spearheaded by state House Speaker Tim Moore, asked the Supreme Court to restrain their state’s then-Democratic controlled high court from wading into a fight on partisan gerrymandering. But while awaiting a final ruling, Republicans won control of North Carolina’s Supreme Court, which overturned the previous court's ruling. Republican lawmakers are expected to redraw the lines this summer, and are expected to heavily favor their party.

“I don’t have confidence in North Carolina,” said former Rep. G. K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), who was once a state supreme court justice, pointing out that the changed partisan makeup of the state high court affects the ultimate outcome there. “I have no confidence that that court will overturn the maps.”

Republicans agree. “This decision has no practical effect on the already-underway redistricting effort in North Carolina. We look forward to the North Carolina General Assembly drawing fair lines that best represent North Carolina,” Jack Pandol, a spokesperson for the House GOP campaign arm, said in a statement.

The court’s decision on Tuesday also seemingly blessed the authority of independent redistricting commissions, which were the subject of a 5-4 divided Supreme Court ruling less than a decade ago. Both parties have benefitted from independent mapmakers in different states — but a world where California Democrats, for example, could gerrymander unabashedly would have been disastrous for GOP representation on the West Coast.

GOP operatives say the current judicial arms race began in the run-up to the 2018 midterms when Democrats secured a majority on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and then successfully sued to have the Republican-drawn map overturned.

The result: The Pennsylvania congressional delegation went from five Democrats and 13 Republicans to an even 9-9 split. Democrats took back the House majority for the first time in eight years.

The Supreme Court reinforced Democrats’ strategy in 2019 when it ruled that federal courts had no role in policing partisan gerrymandering — but left the door open for states to do so.

For Republicans, that was a wake-up call. They started pouring millions into judicial races in key states like North Carolina. In states where justices are appointed, they leaned on GOP governors to tip the scales.

A handful of states have partisan gerrymandering litigation pending in the state courts. Earlier this year, New Mexico Republicans argued that the state’s congressional maps were gerrymandered to benefit Democrats. A Democratic-controlled legislature crafted a map that helped now-Rep. Gabe Vasquez (D-N.M.) oust then-incumbent Republican Rep. Yvette Herrell from her district. Herrell has already mounted a comeback bid.

But one of the judges said in January the state Supreme Court is going to be “deliberative” and won’t rush to a decision.

State Supreme Court hearings are also upcoming in Utah on July 11 and in Kentucky on Sept. 19. Both of those cases deal with GOP-controlled maps, with Republicans sweeping all four congressional districts in Utah and all but one in Kentucky.

In the immediate aftermath of Tuesday’s decision, Republicans were quick to point out that the Supreme Court does not give state courts unchecked authority in redistricting and other redistricting litigation.

“The questions presented in this area are complex and context specific,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in his opinion. “We hold only that state courts may not transgress the ordinary bounds of judicial review such that they arrogate to themselves the power vested in state legislatures to regulate federal elections.”

That, some court watchers argue, is a clear shot across the bow to state judiciaries to not get carried away.

“This is a first, positive step toward reining in recent overreaches of state courts,” said Adam Kincaid, the president of the National Republican Redistricting Trust.

Nicholas Wu contributed to this report.

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Kansas City teen recounts being shot after he rang wrong doorbell

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — There was no way, Ralph Yarl thought, that the white man pointing the gun at him through the glass door would shoot him. But the Black teenager, who had gone to the wrong house in Kansas City looking for his younger brothers, was wrong a second time.

Yarl’s brothers were actually at a home a block away, and he said in an interview with “Good Morning America” anchor Robin Roberts that aired Tuesday that he hadn’t met the family of his brothers’ friends, “so maybe it was their house.”

After ringing the doorbell, he said, he waited a long time on the porch before the door opened.

“I see this old man and I’m saying, ‘Oh, this must be like, their grandpa,’” said Yarl, now 17. “And then he pulls out his gun. And I’m like, ‘Whoa!’ So I like, back up. He points it at me.”

Yarl braced and turned his head.

“And then it happened, and then I’m on the ground. I fall on the glass, the shattered glass,” he told Roberts, and “then before I know it, I’m running away, shouting, ‘Help me! Help me!’”

Yarl was bleeding and said he wondered how it was possible that he had been shot in the head. The man he had never met before said only five words to him, he said: “Don’t come here ever again.”

Andrew Lester, 84, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree assault and armed criminal action in the April 13 shooting.

Lester admitted that he shot Yarl through the door without warning because he was “scared to death” he was about to be robbed by the Black person standing there. He remains free after posting $20,000 — 10% of his $200,000 bond.

The shooting drew international attention amid claims that Lester received preferential treatment from investigators. President Joe Biden and several celebrities issued statements calling for justice. Yarl’s attorney, Lee Merritt, has called for the shooting to be investigated as a hate crime.

Yarl’s mother, Cleo Nagbe, said on “Good Morning America” that she had been worried that her son got a flat tire, but that she then got a call from police telling her about the shooting, and she headed to the hospital. He was partially alert, but it was traumatizing, she said.

Ten weeks later, Yarl is physically recovered but said that he has headaches and trouble sleeping and that sometimes his mind is just foggy.

“You’re looking at a kid that took the SAT when he was in eighth grade — and now his brain is slowed,” Nagbe told Roberts. “So physically he looks fine. But there’s a lot that has been taken from him.”

Yarl said he is seeing a therapist and hopes to continue his recovery by focusing on his passions for chemical engineering and for music.

“I’m just a kid and not larger than life because this happened to me,” Yarl said. “I’m just going to keep doing all the stuff that makes me happy. And just living my life the best I can, and not let this bother me.”

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