In one week, the U.S. Supreme Court has twice shot down Missouri Republicans' attempts to implement their gerrymandered map aimed at wresting an additional congressional seat from Democrats.

The Republican secretary of state, Denny Hoskins, was forced by the state's high court — during an unprecedented Thursday contempt hearing that could have resulted in his jailing — to concede and use the state's existing congressional map, which was drawn in 2022.

Still, some of the state's GOP leaders continue to suggest there is a path to implement their preferred congressional map to give the party a 7-1 edge rather than the 6-2 advantage it currently holds.

That path, they say, is through the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

The last-ditch effort to revive the 2025 gerrymandered map comes in spite of a U.S. Supreme Court stay that legal scholars say gives it final say over any effort to overturn the Missouri Supreme Court's unanimous decision finding Hoskins inappropriately blocked a citizen referendum petition to suspend the new map until a public vote.

The conservative-dominated 8th Circuit on Thursday — on its own motion, rather than a request from any of the parties to the case — ordered briefing on the federal case out of St. Louis that had kept the GOP-map alive for several days this week. The order came just a day after the same appeals court said it had no jurisdiction to review the temporary restraining order the St. Louis federal judge issued Tuesday that kept the gerrymandered map in play.

"An 8th Circuit opinion here is legally stayed until (the U.S. Supreme Court) lifts its ruling," Justin Levitt, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University said Thursday. "And since today's order came without any noted dissent, that's not going to happen."

Still, U.S. Rep. Bob Onder, R-Mo., one of the plaintiffs in the St. Louis federal lawsuit, had not given up Thursday, even after Hoskins conceded and the Supreme Court issued its stay.

"This isn't over. The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals decided to take up, on the merits, the lawsuit," Onder told reporters Thursday. "And I am hopeful we will prevail in the outcome."

Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe — who called lawmakers into special session last year at President Donald Trump's request for an extraordinary mid-decade redistricting carving up a Democratic district in Kansas City — also suggested there still was hope for the 2025 map.

"I look forward to the 8th Circuit’s consideration of the merits of the Missouri First Map and remain confident in the legal process moving forward," Kehoe said on social media late Thursday, a message Hoskins reposted. "Voters deserve certainty and clarity."

They have gotten little of that in a whirlwind week of legal maneuvering.

After the Missouri Supreme Court unanimously ruled Sept. 3 that the 2025 map never had taken effect because opponents had gathered some 300,000 signatures to trigger the state's referendum process, Missouri Republican leaders appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court and filed a separate lawsuit in U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Missouri, which is dominated by Trump-appointees.

St. Louis U.S. District Court Judge Stephen Clark agreed with Onder and his co-plaintiffs that changing the map, after voters already had cast ballots in the August primary using the 2025 boundaries, violated the U.S. Constitution's equal protection clause, "effectively nullifying their votes." He issued an order forbidding the use of any other map in November, in direct conflict with the Missouri Supreme Court's ruling.

On Wednesday, the 8th Circuit rejected an appeal of Clark's temporary restraining order from the referendum group, People Not Politicians, saying it did not have jurisdiction to consider it. By 9:30 a.m. the next day, the U.S. Supreme Court had stayed Clark's order, even after U.S. Solicitor General D. John Sauer — a former St. Louisan and law partner with Judge Clark — weighed in on behalf of the Trump administration and asked the court to let the order stand.

After the U.S. Supreme Court order put the 6-2 map back in place for November, the 8th Circuit then decided it could hear the appeal after all. It ordered briefs on the case by Tuesday and scheduled oral arguments for Thursday.

The statutory deadline for sending ballots to the military and other Americans overseas is Sept. 19, two days after arguments.

That is a fast-paced briefing schedule, said Travis Crum, a Washington University law professor who studies election and constitutional law. Even so, the U.S. Supreme Court's stay will remain in effect even if the 8th Circuit does something before the overseas ballot deadline, he said. The Supreme Court's stay is structured to remain in place until the high court acts on it again.

"The case could keep going after the 2026 elections," Crum said. "It is possible the plaintiffs want to get a precedent on the books that once a primary happens you cannot change the districts before a general election."

Levitt, the Loyola Law professor, called the briefing schedule in the appeals court "performative."

"The 8th Circuit expedited schedule is so pointless on the merits that I suspect it's got an audience of one, which is wildly inappropriate," he said, alluding to President Trump. "It's one thing if you're already writing an opinion. It's another to schedule a proceeding that you know in advance won't matter.

"The war's over," he added, "but there's still soldiers fighting."

_____

© 2026 the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Visit www.stltoday.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.