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Marcia Coyle, the NLJ's chief Washington correspondent, sits down with Paul Smith, the former Jenner & Block appellate veteran who's now vice president for litigation and strategy at the Campaign Legal Center and teaching at Georgetown University Law Center.

Smith's argued two election-law cases this term—the Wisconsin partisan gerrymandering case Gill v. Whitford and later the Ohio voter-rolls dispute Husted v. A. Philip Randolph Institute. The justices in December granted review in a second gerrymandering case, out of Maryland.

“I think almost everyone was completely surprised that they took the second case in December,” Smith said in a conversation Tuesday. “It may well have been they just thought they're going to deal with the subject once and for all. They want to have as much input as possible.” He added: “Or, and this really is speculation, but they might have welcomed having a map gerrymandered by the Democrats along with one gerrymandered by Republicans.”

Watch the video above or at the link here.

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