December 02, 2011 10:52 PM UTC

GOP Hits Judicial Wall on Redistricting

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• by: Colorado Pols

As the Durango Herald’s Joe Hanel reports:

Republicans appealing a court ruling that drew favorable congressional districts for Democrats ran up against a skeptical state Supreme Court on Thursday…

Denver Chief District Judge Robert Hyatt chose a map drawn by Democrats that strips most of Douglas County, a Republican stronghold, out of Coffman’s district and puts it into the Eastern Plains, also a safe GOP district.

In return, Coffman got the whole city of Aurora, a racially and politically diverse place that makes his next election much harder to win…

“This is a square peg in a round hole. Douglas County shares no community of interest with the Eastern Plains,” Republican lawyer Richard Westfall said.

But the justices pushed back against Westfall.

“I thought the chief judge did a lot better job than what you’re characterizing,” Justice Gregory Hobbs said. [Pols emphasis]

We said previously that although the Colorado Supreme Court’s remanding of state legislative reapportionment maps back to the commission is a stated reason by Republicans to have appealed the congressional redistricting maps, citing “similarities” between the two cases, they really aren’t similar at all. It was our expectation that getting the Supreme Court to remand Judge Robert Hyatt’s congressional map would be a much bigger lift than the commission-drawn legislative maps–and based on the chilly reception Richard Westfall and the GOP got in the Old Supreme Court chambers yesterday, we think that will probably be the story of this appeal.

And no, it’s not what Mike Coffman was hoping against hope for.