The debate over Missouri’s mid-decade redistricting plan and changes to the ballot initiative process took center stage on The Record with Mark Maxwell, which airs Fridays at 12:30 p.m. on 5 On Your Side.
Rep. Brad Banderman, a Republican, defended both efforts in his interview on The Record. He argued the state’s initiative petition process should require broad consensus from voters in all corners of the state. “I don’t believe it should be easier for people outside of the building to get something both placed on the ballot and passed than it is for our representatives, the ones that we elect,” Banderman said.
On redistricting, he acknowledged politics play a role. “I think the idea that the other party wouldn’t draw maps that were favorable to them, I think is a pretty weak argument. I think we see that around the United States,” he said.
Rep. LaKeySha Bosley, a Democrat from St. Louis, told The Record the mid-decade map redraw amounts to disenfranchisement. “We’re here because a corrupt regime of Republicans want to overturn access for people in the state of Missouri as well as dilute the representation of Black and brown Congress folk,” she said.
Bosley argued Missouri is closer to a 5–3 political balance than the current 6–2 map and warned the proposed 7–1 map would push the state further out of step with voters. “A lot of this has to do with race because majority of the areas that they’re unpacking and they’re trying to pack into rural communities are densely populated with minority folk,” Bosley said.
Retired Missouri Supreme Court Judge Michael Wolff also appeared on The Record, raising concerns about the legality of both proposals. Forcing a majority vote in every county to pass statewide ballot initiatives, he said, “may… be a legal problem” under one-person, one-vote protections.
On redistricting, Wolff said the state constitution makes clear the process should promptly follow the release of new census data.
The Constitution is fairly clear about redistricting because the Constitution says that when the state receives the results of the census, that’s when the state finds out how many districts it has. Then the General Assembly, by law, is to divide the state into the number of districts that the state has,” Wolff said. “So my view is that ‘when’ means when.”
“The Missouri Constitution follows (federal law) by saying when you get the census, that’s when you do redistricting. I think they’re out of time doing it in the midcourse, and I think there probably will be a challenge to that,” he said.
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