SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - A lawsuit filed by supporters of splitting California in two is seeking to enlarge the state legislature.
The federal lawsuit filed against California’s secretary of state argues that rural counties aren’t fairly represented in the legislature, The Sacramento Bee reported (https://tinyurl.com/m2mbxy5) Tuesday. The lawsuit argues that 40 state senators and 80 Assembly members is insufficient representation for a state of 40 million people.
The lawsuit also argues that apportioning legislative districts equally by population has diluted the votes of rural residents and given more representation to city dwellers. The lawsuit seeks one representative for each county and to add more members to the Assembly.
The lawsuit was filed by activists seeking to carve a new “State of Jefferson” out of 21 Northern California counties.
Mark Baird, a retired pilot from Siskiyou County and a leader of the movement, said he hopes the lawsuit will show California politicians that there’s a serious desire to split the state in two. A settlement in the activists’ favor could prompt lawmakers to split the state rather than take on an onerous task of reorganizing the legislature, Baird said.
So far, Baird and other activists have been unsuccessful in convincing a lawmaker to take up their cause and introduce state-splitting legislation.
“Not one single legislator…would even bother to give us five minutes of their time,” Baird said. “If all we get out of this lawsuit is more and better representation, then that’s a good day for everybody.”
Nathaniel Persily, a redistricting expert at Stanford Law School, called the lawsuit “a nonstarter.”
Persily said the “one person, one vote” approach has become “so entrenched,” Persily said. “It’s not even open for debate at this point.”
Since President Donald Trump’s election, a number of Californians have expressed a desire for the state to secede from the union. About 61 percent of the California electorate voted for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.
Some activists started a so-called “Calexit” campaign to qualify a secession question for the state ballot. But the campaign stumbled when it was disclosed that its leader Louis Martinelli lives in Russia. Last month, Martinelli said he was withdrawing the petition he filed with the California secretary of state.
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