On September 19, North Dakota filed this brief in Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians v Howe, 25-253. This is a case over legislative redistricting. The Eighth Circuit had said the lawsuit couldn’t proceed because it had started when the Turtle Mountain Band had filed under the federal Voting Rights Act, section 2, but that the Eighth Circuit thought that private groups can’t file under that law; only the federal government could institute such lawsuits. No Circuit had ever before come to that conclusion.

The North Dakota brief acknowledges that the U.S. Supreme Court will need to settle this important issue, but suggests that the Court should not take this case. But it says if the Court does take it, he hopes the Court will decide by December 31, 2025, whether to take it, because the state needs to know in order to prepare for the 2026 election.