No sooner did Governor Andy Beshear veto House Bill 2 and Senate Bill 3 Wednesday night — sweeping aside both the most-recent house and congressional redistricting maps — did the Republican majorities in both bodies override his pen Thursday afternoon.
During his weekly “Team Kentucky” update, Beshear doubled down on his concerns of “gerrymandering” and the splitting of particular counties — stating that non-partisan groups should be helping decide the voting boundaries.
And he took a very pointed angle against former Governor Matt Bevin.
Beshear’s veto memo directly discussed his reason for the move late Wednesday night, but he readdressed them on Thursday morning — just hours before the State House and State Senate made their roll calls on the override.
Per Lexington Herald-Leader reporter Austin Horn, the House overrode its veto 69-23 — with 22 Democrats and one Republican, Marion’s Lynn Bechler, comprising the “no” votes. Bechler was drawn into another incumbent’s district.
The Senate, meanwhile, overrode its veto and confirmed the House’s override of HB2 24-10 — bringing its map to law.
Lawsuits from Democrats are already pending in Franklin County, and Beshear — not offering legal advice as a non-practicing lawyer on frozen status — added that it’s possible to see some success against these overrides.
This isn’t the first, nor will it be the last, time the redistricting discussion of Kentucky comes into focus.
In a 2012 27-page conclusion from the Kentucky Supreme Court, justices determined that House Bill 1 — then drafted by a Democratic majority — violated Section 33 of the Kentucky Constitution, because it did not achieve “sufficient population equality, nor preserve county integrity.” It went on to note that the State House and State Senate redistricting plans failed to “divide the fewest number of counties mathematically possible,” and that each plan “contained at least one district with a population deviation greater than 5% of an ideal district.”
With ensuing litigation likely, Beshear said he still needs to review further details before making an ultimate decision on pushing back filing dates for partisan political races across the state.
In a December 4, 2020, article from Kentucky Public Radio Capital Bureau Chief Ryland Barton, stated the redistricting process wouldn’t begin “in earnest” for the Commonwealth until the 2022 legislative session — due to the coronavirus and delayed release of U.S. Census Bureau data.
That time has arrived.
