Federal appeals court puts Missouri’s congressional maps back in action

After a back-and-forth legal battle making its way as high as the U.S. Supreme Court, Missouri has been ordered to conduct November’s midterm elections using the congressional maps drawn by the Republican-led legislature in 2025.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit ruled late Sept. 21 that the 2025 maps are not only constitutional but that not using the maps after they were already used to conduct primary elections in August would violate the Constitution.

The Missouri Supreme Court had ruled on Sept. 3 that Republican Secretary of State Denny Hoskins could not conduct November’s midterm elections using the 2025 maps, which are expected to flip one seat in the U.S. House of Representatives from Democratic to Republican control. The state’s high court determined that a petition brought by the Democrat-aligned organization People Not Politicians was sufficient grounds for terminating the legislature’s maps.

The ruling was appealed to the federal level, triggering a cascade of seemingly conflicting rulings. The U.S. Supreme Court initially declined to intervene in an appeal filed by Hoskins, allowing the Missouri Supreme Court’s decision to stand, but District Chief Judge Stephen Clark issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) requiring the use of the 2025 maps, in response to another lawsuit filed by Republican politicians and voters.

>> Missouri Supreme Court’s election ruling triggers dueling federal responses <<

The Eighth Circuit initially upheld Clark’s TRO, but the U.S. Supreme Court intervened Sept. 10 and stayed Clark’s order. Notably, the high court stayed Clark’s order “pending the disposition of the appeal in the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit and disposition of a petition for a writ of certiorari in this Court.”

In Monday’s ruling, the Eighth Circuit remanded the case back to Clark and ordered the district court to convert the TRO into a permanent injunction, effectively mandating use of the 2025 maps for November’s elections.

“This Court holds that Missouri’s current plan to use the 2022 map in the November 2026 general election violates the Constitution. Only use of the 2025 map complies with the Constitution and federal law,” the appellate judges wrote.

“Using the 2025 map,” they continued, “will lead to the least amount of confusion for voters subjected to a string of changes this month. For approximately one year, Missouri operated under the 2025 map. During that time, Missourians filed to run for Congress, met candidates, watched campaign advertisements, received campaign mail, and voted under the 2025 map. Any confusion stems from the last-minute decision by a state court to switch the congressional map.”

>> Supreme Court intervenes in Missouri elections case <<

Whether or not the Missouri Supreme Court’s interpretation of the state’s constitution is correct, the Eighth Circuit determined that the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of core voting rights overrides the state constitution. Since primary elections were conducted using the 2025 maps, barring the use of those maps would force Missourians in the impacted districts to vote for candidates that they did not nominate for office.

“Denying approximately one-fourth of Missourians the ability to vote for the nominees that will appear on their November 2026 general election ballot deprives these voters of their constitutional right of choice under Article I, Section 2,” the judges wrote. “Article I, Section 2’s right to participate in the procedure of choosing a member of Congress requires continuity in the constituency throughout all stages of a single election. Changing district lines between the primary and general election prevents an affected voter from participating in either district’s complete procedure of choice.”

The Eighth Circuit stayed its own order for a seven-day period in order to provide the U.S. Supreme Court an opportunity to review.