Appellate Court Greenlights Redrawing of Staten Island Congressional District, Likely Giving Democrats Another Seat

An appellate court is upholding a state judge’s order requiring that New York City’s lone GOP congressional district be redrawn, which will likely net Democrats one more seat in the U.S. House. The district, which covers all of Staten Island and parts of southern Brooklyn, will now likely be changed so that the outer borough will be in the same district as parts of Manhattan. Last year, voters in New York’s 11th congressional district sued the state board of elections, saying that the district’s lines violated the state constitution. Their argument was that the drawing of the map diluted the voting power of non-white communities. In January, Justice Jeffrey Pearlman of the New York County Supreme Court sided with those voters, saying in his opinion that the state constitution required that the map be redrawn. “Based on the facts presented by the expert witness reports and on the record, it is clear to the Court that the current district lines … are a contributing factor in the lack of representation for minority voters,” he wrote at the time. The district’s current representative, Congresswoman Nicole Malliotakis, has already taken this case to the federal level. She and voters in her district have filed an emergency request to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking that Justice Pearlman’s order be put on hold. The trial court’s order has thrown New York’s elections into chaos on the eve of the 2026 Congressional Election,” Ms. Malliotakis’s lawyers write to the court. Those seeking to block Justice Pearlman’s order make three arguments — that redrawing the map would create an unconstitutional racial gerrymander, that the processes leading to the decision “violated due process,” and that the decision violates court precedent. The application for a stay of Justice Pearlman’s decision was sent directly to Justice Sonia Sotomayor. The court is due to respond to Ms. Malliotakis before Tuesday. If the state is required to redraw Ms. Malliotakis’s district, then the most likely outcome is that the 11th district and the deep-blue neighboring 10th district swap certain communities. Under Justice Pearlman’s order, the new 11th district would be transformed to include all of Staten Island and the southern tip of Manhattan, which is currently in the 10th district. The 10th district would go from being composed of southern Manhattan and western Brooklyn to instead covering eastern and southeastern Brooklyn, while a few precincts at the southeastern tip of Manhattan would remain in the 10th district. If this were to happen, the 11th district would move from being a district that President Trump won by 24 points to one that he lost by just over three points to Vice President Kamala Harris in the last election. The 10th district would remain deep-blue, however, given that it absorbs some of the most Democratic parts of southern Brooklyn. Democrats already seem prepared for such a scenario. Currently, the incumbent in the 10th district, Congressman Dan Goldman, is facing a primary challenge from his left by former city comptroller Brad Lander, who has been endorsed by Mayor Mamdani. After Justice Pearlman’s decision last month, Mr. Goldman hinted that he may just run in the new 11th district to flip it for the Democrats, thus guaranteeing his party an additional seat while avoiding an intraparty ideological battle with Mr. Lander. “Our top priority must be to retake the majority and make Hakeem Jeffries Speaker, and I will always place that goal first,” Mr. Goldman wrote on X at the time of Justice Pearlman’s decision, implying that he would be up for the fight in a new district. The redistricting battles across the country have so far turned out to be a wash for Republicans, though there are still some potential areas for movement. Virginia voters will go to the polls in April to decide whether or not they want to eliminate five Republican districts in their state. If that measure does pass, then the state supreme court still must rule on the legality of the process that led to the statewide ballot initiative. Florida Republicans are also set to redraw their state’s congressional map, though it is unclear how aggressive they will be. Governor Wes Moore of Maryland is pushing his state senate to vote to eliminate their one GOP congressional district, though the Democratic state senate president has so far pushed back on that, saying that it could lead a new court case that requires Democrats to redraw the entirety of Maryland’s congressional map, thus putting new districts in play.

Appellate Court Greenlights Redrawing of Staten Island Congressional District, Likely Giving Democrats Another Seat

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