\n The Supreme Court sided with opponents of a Republican-friendly congressional map in Missouri on Thursday, rejecting a plan that could have given the GOP an extra seat in the House of Representatives.\n <\/p>\n
\n The order<\/a>, issued without explanation and no noted dissent, will almost certainly mean the state will use a previous map that included six \u2014 rather than seven \u2014 winnable seats for the GOP.\n <\/p>\n \n The one-paragraph decision will affect only a single seat, however, it is an unusual election-related loss for Republicans at the 6-3 conservative Supreme Court. And it undercuts President Donald Trump\u2019s effort to eke an advantage out of state congressional maps across the country to retain Republican control of the House next year.\n <\/p>\n \n \u201cThe law is the law, the Missouri constitution is clear as was the Missouri Supreme Court,\u201d said Richard von Glahn, executive director of People Not Politicians Missouri, the group that challenged the map and filed the emergency appeal at the Supreme Court. \u201cOver 305,000 Missouri voters \u2014 Republicans, Democrats and independents \u2014 took action to block this political power grab last fall.\u201d\n <\/p>\n \n Aides to Missouri Attorney General Catherine Hanaway, a Republican, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.\n <\/p>\n \n Even without the seat they sought to gain in Missouri, Republicans have still drawn nine more seats in their favor than Democrats have, according to a CNN analysis<\/a>. That could be a bulwark for the GOP as it tries to hold onto House control facing major headwinds in Trump\u2019s unpopularity and national concerns about the economy and cost of living.\n <\/p>\n \n That doesn\u2019t mean the GOP will gain nine seats this fall due to redistricting. Democrats believe they can still hold onto several of the seats drawn to Republican advantage, particularly in districts with significant Latino populations that shifted to the right during Trump\u2019s 2024 victory but have shown signs of moving back toward the left.\n <\/p>\n \n People Not Politicians, organized a campaign to put the new GOP-friendly map to a referendum after the state legislature approved the map last year. Missouri\u2019s highest court had backed that effort last week, effectively requiring the state to revert to an earlier map. And when state officials appealed that ruling to the US Supreme Court last week, Justice Brett Kavanaugh declined to review it<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n That decision, it turned out, wasn\u2019t the end of the dispute. Minutes after Kavanaugh issued a brief one-sentence order, a federal judge in Missouri reviewing a different case handed down a temporary order that effectively pushed state officials back to the map that advantaged the GOP. Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins, a Republican, said the state would proceed with the GOP map.\n <\/p>\n \n People Not Politicians filed a flurry of appeals seeking to pause that order from US District Judge Stephen Clark, a Trump nominee. And on Wednesday evening, the case returned to the US Supreme Court<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n But the high court\u2019s quick resolution of the case \u2014 without any substantial writing or dissent \u2014 suggests that for all the drama and confusion around the litigation, Missouri never stood much of a chance. It\u2019s not clear why the Supreme Court sided with People Not Politicians, but critics noted that much of the dispute around the second map involved questions of state and not federal law.\n <\/p>\n \n The Supreme Court\u2019s conservative majority \u2014 and Kavanaugh, in particular \u2014 have frequently also cited a legal doctrine known as the \u201cPurcell principle\u201d that warns federal courts against ruling in election cases that could change the status quo right before an election.\n <\/p>\n \n Earlier Thursday, the Trump Justice Department urged the Supreme Court to side with the Missouri Republicans, arguing that the group organizing opposition to the GOP-friendly map lacks the right to sue, known as standing, because it had not demonstrated how it would be harmed by the map. And it backed an argument raised by a Republican congressman in the state that switching maps between the primary and general elections raises equal protection concerns.\n <\/p>\n