NY redistricting plan gets an earful in Queens

Lohud.com wrote about a redistricting hearing where Senator Gianaris spoke out against the Senate Republicans' redistricting scheme, which he says has "brought shame to the state of New York."

Democratic Sen. Michael Gianaris told a packed redistricting hearing Tuesday that the Senate's Republican majority has brought "shame" to New York by proposing blatant gerrymandering in a continuing plot to protect its power.

 

In the sometimes raucous redistricting hearing in Queens, Gianaris accused the Republican senators of presenting intentionally atrocious lines statewide earlier this month to intentionally draw Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo's veto. Gianaris said that will be followed soon by slightly improved lines, which would go to Cuomo or the courts. Gianaris doesn't predict what would happen next.

 

That revision could then become law with the approval of Cuomo, a close ally of the Republican majority on fiscal issues, or approved by the courts.

 

"Gentlemen, your actions have embarrassed yourselves and brought shame to the state of New York," Gianaris said. He is one of a half-dozen Democratic senators pitted against others in the Republicans' proposed districts. Gianaris, head of the Senate Democrats' campaign committee this election year, would no longer live in the district he represents under the Republican proposal.

Read the full article here.