Brandon Kingdollar, reporting for NC Newsline:
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| Sen. Ralph Hise |
The challenge, filed in the Western District of North Carolina by seven Watauga County voters and joined by voting rights advocacy groups, argues that Senate Bill 759, passed in 2023, imposes “unconstitutional, malapportioned electoral districts with large population deviations,” violating the legal principle of one person, one vote.
“The Plan dilutes the votes of Democratic voters by systematically overpopulating the districts in which Democrats have the opportunity to elect their candidates of choice and systematically underpopulating the districts in which Republicans have the opportunity to elect their candidates of choice,” the complaint states.
Watauga Board of Elections Director Matthew Snyder declined to comment on pending litigation. A spokesperson for Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger (R-Rockingham) did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The lawsuit names the Watauga County Board of Elections and its members as defendants. Advocacy organizations Common Cause North Carolina and the Watauga County Voting Rights Task Force are also plaintiffs in the suit.
Under the previous election system, county commissioners were elected to five residential districts — meaning candidates must live in the district they represent, but the county’s residents vote in all five elections — yielding three Democratic commissioners and two Republicans.
After the new map, made up of electoral districts — where only residents of the district vote on that district’s commissioner — the board is made up of five Republicans. Two districts encompassing most of Boone will not elect commissioners until 2026 under S.B. 759, leaving the majority of the town’s residents with no representation, according to the lawsuit.
Following the election, the three Republicans elected to the commission appointed two Republicans to the remaining vacancies, seats held by Republicans that were vacated to run in the new election.
While the initial law applied the districts only to the Watauga Board of Commissioners, a subsequent bill passed in 2024, Senate Bill 912, extended them to the Watauga Board of Education. The lawsuit also challenges that piece of legislation.
The U.S. Supreme Court decided in a 2019 ruling on North Carolina maps that “partisan gerrymandering claims present political questions beyond the reach of the federal courts.” The North Carolina Supreme Court also views such claims as “nonjusticiable under the North Carolina Constitution,” upholding Republican-leaning maps in 2023.
The Watauga complaint centers its legal claims on nonpartisan classes of voters instead, including location and perceived duration of residence. The complaint alleges that Sen. Ralph Hise (R-Mitchell) sought to dilute the votes of urban students to boost the voting power of rural residents of the county.
Hise, a Republican whose district includes Watauga, was the lone sponsor of both bills. He said on the state Senate floor in 2023 that he was motivated to counteract “the predominance of [Appalachian State University] and others in the electoral process.” The complaint quotes him pointing to “a longtime standing conflict between the influence of the university and others within the county.”
These remarks, the plaintiffs argue, are an admission of two unconstitutional criteria for the maps: geographic favoritism and discrimination against perceived temporary residents.
Hise did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
[The Fate of Last Year's Local Referendum]
When the Watauga Board of Commissioners voted to hold a local referendum proposing new maps without those discrepancies, the General Assembly added to S.B. 912 a provision barring any referendum enacted by Watauga County voters impacting the county commission from taking effect until after the 2032 elections.
Despite the referendum’s passage by a 71% to 29% margin in 2024, it will not take effect for nearly a decade. This violates the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection, the complaint alleges.
“The voters of Watauga County will be stuck with unconstitutional districts for their County Commission and Board of Education, unless this Court intervenes,” the lawsuit states. “Fundamentally, the people of Watauga County have no choice but to petition this Court for urgently needed relief from Defendants’ ongoing violations of their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights.”
The individual plaintiffs include six Democratic voters and one unaffiliated voter. Three are former members of the Watauga County Board of Commissioners, including Larry Turnbow and Charlie Wallin, who served as chair and vice-chair prior to the 2024 election.
“Watauga County residents voted to adopt fair districts while rejecting the gerrymandered maps imposed on us by the legislature,” said Ray Russell, the other former commissioner joining the lawsuit. “We’re filing this lawsuit to protect our mountain community against the unconstitutional overreach by politicians in Raleigh.”
When the Watauga Board of Commissioners voted to hold a local referendum proposing new maps without those discrepancies, the General Assembly added to S.B. 912 a provision barring any referendum enacted by Watauga County voters impacting the county commission from taking effect until after the 2032 elections.
Despite the referendum’s passage by a 71% to 29% margin in 2024, it will not take effect for nearly a decade. This violates the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection, the complaint alleges.
“The voters of Watauga County will be stuck with unconstitutional districts for their County Commission and Board of Education, unless this Court intervenes,” the lawsuit states. “Fundamentally, the people of Watauga County have no choice but to petition this Court for urgently needed relief from Defendants’ ongoing violations of their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights.”
The individual plaintiffs include six Democratic voters and one unaffiliated voter. Three are former members of the Watauga County Board of Commissioners, including Larry Turnbow and Charlie Wallin, who served as chair and vice-chair prior to the 2024 election.
“Watauga County residents voted to adopt fair districts while rejecting the gerrymandered maps imposed on us by the legislature,” said Ray Russell, the other former commissioner joining the lawsuit. “We’re filing this lawsuit to protect our mountain community against the unconstitutional overreach by politicians in Raleigh.”
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