WASHINGTON - Justice Brett Kavanaugh on September 8 denied Missouri's emergency application to reinstate the state's 2025 mid-decade congressional map, ending the emergency phase of a fight The 901 Report has followed since the state filed its application. He acted alone on the application, without referring it to the full Court, and coverage of the denial reports no written opinion and no noted dissent.
The denial leaves standing the Missouri Supreme Court's September 3 ruling, which blocked the 2025 map after the Secretary of State certified a citizen referendum against it. Missouri's November 3 election will now run on the 2022 districts, which the Missouri Independent reports are expected to elect six Republicans and two Democrats.
The timing the state warned about now works in reverse. Missouri told the Court its ballot-change deadline under state law was September 10 and asked for a decision by September 14. The denial arrived September 8, inside the state's own window, and ballots begin delivery to Missouri counties September 19.
The referendum itself is not over. Proposition A, the up-or-down vote on the 2025 map, remains on the November 3 ballot. Missouri voters will decide the map's fate directly, while voting for Congress under the older districts on the same ballot.
The voters' side had completed the briefing one day earlier. People Not Politicians, the campaign that suspended the map by referendum, filed its opposition September 7, arguing the Court should not reward what it called a scheme to outsmart Missouri voters by timing the certification to run out the clock. Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins has defended his office's handling of the petition. A separate federal case over the map, brought by Representative Bob Onder and others, remains pending.
Prior coverage: Missouri's Map Appeal Is Now on Justice Kavanaugh's Desk, With Answers Due September 7.
Why It Matters for Memphis
Tennessee redrew its own congressional map in a special session this year, and litigation over mid-decade maps moves through the same federal courts and the same emergency docket. The Missouri denial is the second time in roughly a week that the Court's emergency docket declined to rescue a state's contested map arrangement on a compressed election calendar. Whatever pattern the shadow docket sets in these cases is the environment Tennessee's map fight lives in.
The Oversight Question
Missouri's constitution gives voters a referendum power, and the state's chief election officer controls the clock on certifying it. When the office holding the clock is also a party that benefits from running it out, who checks the timekeeper? The courts just declined to, twice, in the voters' favor.
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