Missouri election chief could be held in contempt for using gerrymandered map amid dueling court orders

The Missouri Supreme Court gave the state’s top election official until 1pm EST Wednesday to explain why he shouldn’t be held in contempt for violating the court’s Sept. 3 order preventing him from using a gerrymandered congressional map that will give Republicans an advantage in November’s midterms.

The court zeroed in on an email sent Tuesday afternoon by Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins (R) to election officials, directing them to use the gerrymandered map. Hoskins sent the message after two conflicting court rulings that afternoon threw the year-long legal battle over the map into chaos. 

First, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh denied Missouri Republicans’ request to pause the state supreme court’s order last week barring Hoskins from using the map in the general election.* The justice issued no rationale for the decision.

It appeared the gerrymander would not go into effect and its opponents had resoundingly defeated it. But then, just minutes later, a federal district court judge granted a temporary restraining order preventing Missouri from using its previous map. 

Despite the conflicting federal court orders and the state Supreme Court’s still-standing ruling, Hoskins immediately decided to move forward with the gerrymandered map ahead of Missouri’s deadline Tuesday for finalizing ballots for the general election. “Information provided by the litigation team is that the federal court’s ruling, based on federal law, takes precedence over the Missouri Supreme Court’s order, which is based on state law,” Hoskins wrote in an email to state election officials Tuesday night. “This is in accordance with the U.S. Supremacy Clause.”

Missouri Supreme Court Chief Judge W. Brent Powell quickly issued a court order asking Hoskins to explain himself and scheduling a hearing for Thursday morning.

Powell issued the order after Richard von Glahn, executive director of pro-voting group People Not Politicians Missouri (PNP), asked him to hold Hoskins in contempt.

Von Glahn called Hoskins’ order to election officials “a direct violation of this court’s injunction.” 

“This Court should make clear that regardless of other orders (except from the United States Supreme Court) the Missouri Secretary of State must comply with this court’s injunction,” he wrote. “The Court should instruct all local election authorities that [the new map] is not the law and has never been the law.”

Missouri lawmakers adopted the new congressional map last fall after President Donald Trump called on Republican-led states to conduct unprecedented mid-decade redistricting in a bid to give the GOP a leg up in the 2026 midterm elections.

But Missouri law allows voters to gather signatures to reject new state legislation through a process known as a veto referendum. If the petition qualifies for the ballot, the new legislation does not take effect until Missourians can vote on it. 

PNP collected 300,000 signatures opposing the new map, almost three times the number of signatures required to put the question to voters this November.

But Hoskins ultimately rejected the referendum, waiting until the last second to issue his decision. He argued that the Missouri and U.S. Constitutions do not permit ballot questions on redistricting plans, which led von Glahn to sue. 

The case made its way to the Supreme Court of Missouri. Last week, it sided with von Glahn, ordering the old map to be used in November — even though the new map had been used in this year’s primary elections. 

Missouri Republicans then turned to the federal courts for relief. Shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene Tuesday, Chief U.S. District Judge Stephen Clark for the Eastern District of Missouri granted a temporary restraining order, which Hoskins immediately seized upon to justify moving forward with the gerrymandered map. 

Von Glahn quickly asked the state Supreme Court to hold Hoskins in contempt. 

Powell suggested he agreed with von Glahn’s argument, asking Hoskins to file a response Wednesday explaining “how this Court’s injunction is not still in full force and effect in light of the Supreme Court of the United States’ overruling of Respondent’s emergency application for stay and administrative stay pending appeal.”

*The Elias Law Group (ELG) represented the challengers to the gerrymander in the U.S. Supreme Court. ELG Firm Chair Marc Elias is the founder of Democracy Docket.