The plaintiffs, who had worked for a Northrop Grumman subsidiary, had argued they should have been entitled by federal law to more severance than they received
Democrat mapmakers were "motivated by partisan political considerations," a panel of federal judges said, so it doesn't matter that they divided Latino and Black populations up among various districts, rather than maximizing majority minority districts
Republicans and Latino and Black advocates told a panel of federal judges that Illinois Democrats drew a new state legislative district map solely to protect Democratic incumbents and boost their party power, stepping on Black and Latino voting rights in the process.
Illinois' top Democratic lawmakers asked a panel of federal judges to ignore 'remedial maps' filed by Latino and Black advocacy organizations, with Republican lawmakers, even though the challengers' maps appear to significantly boost the number of majority-minority legislative districts.
The proposed new map, filed with federal judges, would nearly triple the number of majority Latino state House and Senate districts, compared to plan approved by Democrats and signed by Gov. JB Pritzker in September
A panel of federal judges said Democrats' decision to use "population estimates," rather than Census data resulted in unbalanced districts, under a plan rushed through simply to retain firm grip on power
Republicans had asked the court to not give Democrats a "do over" on drawing new legislative district maps, when Democrats had not used Census data on their first attempt, resulting in unbalanced districts..
Democrats intend to use a late August special session to redraw Illinois' state legislative districts to align with Census data, but Republicans say their failure to draft legally valid maps earlier this year means the task should go to a special redistricting commission, under Illinois' state constitution.
Illinois Republican lawmakers said their analysis of data released by the U.S. Census Bureau last week shows Democrat-drawn legislative district maps don't meet the requirements of federal law, as they earlier alleged in their lawsuit challenging the maps.
Illinois Democrats assert the lawsuits brought by GOP leaders and a Mexican legal group, which accuse the Democrats of improperly drawing district boundaries without official Census data, must fail because there is no official Census data to compare their new maps against.
How much individual Shutterfly users and other class members could get from the deal will depend on how many people file claims for a cut of a $4 million fund left over after lawyers and settlement administrators are paid.
Mayer Brown announced that 13 partners across five of the firm’s offices have been named “Life Sciences Stars” in the 2020 edition of Euromoney’s Legal Media Group (LMG) Life Sciences guide.
Seventh Circuit Appeals Court in Chicago says some automated dialers acceptable under federal law if they only dial numbers stored in customer databases.
