{"id":139295,"date":"2026-02-19T22:08:06","date_gmt":"2026-02-19T22:08:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/139295\/"},"modified":"2026-02-19T22:08:06","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T22:08:06","slug":"only-supreme-court-remains-ruling-allows-dem-friendly-redrawing-of-staten-islands-congressional-map","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/139295\/","title":{"rendered":"Only Supreme Court remains: Ruling allows Dem-friendly redrawing of Staten Island\u2019s congressional map"},"content":{"rendered":"

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. \u2014 The U.S. Supreme Court may be the only thing standing in the way of a Democratic gerrymander of Staten Island\u2019s congressional district after a Thursday decision from the state Appellate Division.<\/p>\n

Judges with the court\u2019s first department decided unanimously to lift the stay against New York Supreme Court Justice Jeffrey Pearlman\u2019s Jan. 21 order<\/a> to redraw New York\u2019s 11th Congressional District, which Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis currently represents.<\/p>\n

Republicans like Malliotakis say the redistricting order amounts to little more than a political gerrymander ordered by Pearlman, who Gov. Kathy Hochul appointed to the bench in 2021 after he served as her chief of staff during her time as lieutenant governor.<\/p>\n

Staten Island Democrats<\/a> and the plaintiffs who brought the case contend the suit is really about correcting an illegal violation of Black and Latino Staten Islanders political rights. <\/p>\n

Malliotakis calls on Supreme Court to intervene<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Appellate Court\u2019s failure to stay the legally-flawed decision issued by Kathy Hochul\u2019s hand-picked judge represents a failure of New York\u2019s judicial system. New York\u2019s appellate judges had a duty to step in and press the pause button on such a clearly unconstitutional decision,\u201d Malliotakis said Thursday. \u201cThe U.S. Supreme Court has been unequivocal: race-based redistricting violates the U.S. Constitution. I look forward to the Supreme Court\u2019s intervention in this case to uphold the rule of law and preserve the integrity of our elections.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last week, attorneys for Malliotakis asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene staying Pearlman\u2019s decision, and on Thursday, multiple interested parties submitted their positions to the court.<\/p>\n

New York\u2019s Court of Appeals, the state\u2019s highest court, is not expected to intervene in the case after the Appellate Division\u2019s unanimous ruling, so the nation\u2019s highest court is likely Malliotakis\u2019 last chance to block a redrawing of the district.<\/p>\n

Democrats fighting for Staten Island seat could get the edge<\/p>\n

Pearlman\u2019s order didn\u2019t specify how the district should be redrawn, but in their case, the plaintiffs presented an illustrative map that moved the shared portion of district into lower Manhattan neighborhoods like Battery Park City, the Financial District and the West Village.<\/p>\n

Staten Island doesn\u2019t have a large enough population for a congressional district entirely of its own, and the shift into Lower Manhattan would give Democrats an advantage over Malliotakis heading into the November elections.<\/p>\n

While voters in both district-mate options went for former Vice President Kamala Harris in the last presidential election, those in lower Manhattan did so more overwhelmingly, according to an analysis from The City news outlet<\/a>.<\/p>\n

That advantage could help Democrats take the only Republican-held congressional district in the five boroughs, which Malliotakis first won in 2020 when she defeated former Democratic Rep. Max Rose.<\/p>\n

Pearlman sided with plaintiffs\u2019 argument that 2024 maps should\u2019ve brought the 11th Congressional District into Manhattan to create a \u201cminority influence district\u201d where Black and Latino voters on Staten Island could combine with communities in Lower Manhattan to elect their candidates of choice.<\/p>\n

Plaintiffs brought the initial lawsuit against the state Board of Elections and New York\u2019s Democratic leaders, including Hochul, who passed the current map in 2024 but have done little to defend their drawing.<\/p>\n

Attorneys for Malliotakis intervened in the case, and have also filed appeals with the New York Appellate Division and Court of Appeals, the state\u2019s highest court.<\/p>\n

Republicans with the state Board of Elections had set a Feb. 6 deadline as the latest for when new maps could be implemented for the state\u2019s upcoming congressional elections, but that has come and gone.<\/p>\n

Staten Island voters will have to wait on the U.S. Supreme Court to know what their congressional district will look like heading into this year\u2019s elections.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. \u2014 The U.S. Supreme Court may be the only thing standing in the way of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":97087,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[9,24,63,134,136,135],"class_list":["post-139295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-staten-island","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-staten-island","tag-staten-island-headlines","tag-staten-island-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}