Judge Deals Major Blow To 10-Year Santa Monica Voting Rights Lawsuit

SANTA MONICA, CA — A decade-long legal battle over how Santa Monica elects its City Council has taken another dramatic turn after a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge sided with the city in a lawsuit alleging its election system unlawfully dilutes Latino voting power.

Judge Daniel M. Crowley granted Santa Monica's motion for judgment on the pleadings Oct. 16, according to court records independently reviewed by Patch. The ruling marks a significant victory for the city, which has spent years defending its system of electing all seven councilmembers citywide rather than from individual districts. But the legal fight may be far from over.

The city submitted a proposed written order Nov. 5, although the court docket reviewed Wednesday did not show a subsequent signed order or final judgment. Plaintiffs' attorney Kevin Shenkman has indicated he intends to appeal, according to the Santa Monica Lookout, which first reported the latest development Tuesday.

A Decade In The Courts

The dispute began in April 2016, when the Pico Neighborhood Association and Santa Monica resident Maria Loya sued the city, arguing that its at-large election system violated the California Voting Rights Act by weakening Latino voters' ability to elect their preferred candidates or influence election outcomes.

In 2019, Superior Court Judge Yvette Palazuelos ruled in the plaintiffs' favor and ordered Santa Monica to adopt a seven-district election system. The city appealed, and the judgment was stayed before a state appellate court overturned it in 2020. The case subsequently reached the California Supreme Court, which ruled in 2023 that the appellate court had applied an overly restrictive standard for determining whether an election system diluted minority voting power.

The justices did not decide whether Santa Monica's system violated the law. Instead, they returned the case to the appellate court for reconsideration under the clarified standard. The litigation eventually returned to Superior Court.

A New Supreme Court Ruling

The latest ruling follows an April 29 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in Louisiana v. Callais, which found that Louisiana's creation of a second majority-Black congressional district amounted to unconstitutional racial gerrymandering. Santa Monica's attorneys subsequently argued that the decision had implications for the city's long-running dispute, including whether the plaintiffs could prevail without establishing intentional discrimination.

Shenkman disputes that interpretation, arguing that California's voting rights law protects against discriminatory electoral outcomes without requiring proof of discriminatory intent. The city's proposed order relies on the federal ruling, according to the Lookout. However, because the proposed document had not been signed, it should not be treated as the judge's final written explanation.

The court's publicly available docket confirms that Crowley granted the city's motion following an Oct. 16 hearing but does not establish the precise reasoning behind his decision. For now, Santa Monica's at-large election system remains intact, while the prospect of another appeal means a legal battle stretching back to 2016 may yet have another chapter.