Bismarck, ND (AP) – The Federal Court of Appeal will not review its decision on a redistribution case, which went against two Native American tribes, which challenge North Dakota’s legislative card for redistribution and the dispute can be directed to the US Supreme Court.
The case prepared a national interest because of a 2-1 decision issued in May by a three-member group of the 8th Court of Appeal of the United States, which erased the way through the federal voice rights law of people in seven countries to judge under a key provision of the remarkable federal civil rights law. The tribes claim that the 2021 card violates the act by diluting the vote and its ability to choose their own candidates.
The group said only the US Department of Justice could bring such court cases. This followed in 2023 against Arkansas in the same chain, which also stated that individuals could not sue according to Section 2 of the Law.
These decisions contradict the decisions of the appellate courts in other federal chains, which confirmed the rights of individuals to sue according to Section 2, creating a schism that the Supreme Court could be asked to resolve. However, several of the conservative judges of the Supreme Court have recently been interested in making it difficult, if not impossible, to bring court cases under the Voice Rights Act.
Following the May decision, the Spirit Lake tribe and the Turtle Mountains of Chippev Indians requested the Court of Appeal to re -consider all 11 judges. 19 -state general lawyers, many former lawyers of the US Department of Justice, several voice rights historians and others also demanded rehearsal.
But in a decision on Thursday, the full court dismissed the request filed by the Native American Rights Fund and other groups representing the tribes. Three judges said they would provide it, including the chain’s chief judge Stephen Koloton, who disagreed in the previous decision.
The opinion of the majority in May said that in order for the tribes to judge under the Voice Rights Act, the law should “unequivocally” to give the right to individuals or groups to do so.
Lenny Powell, a lawyer for the fund staff, said in a statement that the refusal to review “wrongly restricts voters, discouraged by a map of Gerimander, a redistribution card” by the challenge of this card.
Powell said on Monday that the tribes are now considering their legal capabilities.
Another group representing the tribes, the legal campaign center, stated that the decision was “contrary to both the intention of the Congress in the adoption of the law and the decades of a preceded court of the Supreme Court, confirming the power of the voters to apply the law in court.”
North Dakota’s Secretary of State Michael How did not immediately answer a request for a comment on Monday.
The groups said they would continue to fight to provide fair cards. The decisions of North Dakota and Arkansas are applied only in the states of the 8th round: Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota. As a result of Arkansas’s decision, Minnesota and other countries moved to increase voting rights by state protection to include increasing gaps in the federal law.
The tribes in North Dakota filed their case in 2022. The court panel for three judges heard arguments for appeal last October after Republican Secretary of State Michael How appealed the decision of the lower court of November 2023 in favor of the tribes.
In this decision, US District Judge Peter Welte ordered the creation of a new neighborhood that covers the reservations of the two tribes, which are about 60 miles away (97 kilometers). In 2024, the voters elected members of the two tribes, all the Democrats, the Senate of the Senate of the County and two places for the home.
Republicans hold the control of the super -compliance of North Dakota’s legislative power.
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Karnovski reported from Minneapolis.