A request by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost to hold off enforcement of ruling in the state’s gerrymandering lawsuit is another delay tactic that should be rejected, advocates who won the suit argued in a response filed in federal court Wednesday night.

A panel of three federal judges unanimously ruled Friday that Ohio’s gerrymandered congressional district map is unconstitutional. The judges found that the map “dilutes the votes of Democratic voters by packing and cracking them into districts that are so skewed toward one party that the electoral outcome is predetermined.”

The judges gave the state until June 14 to enact a new map so preparations could begin for the 2020 election. Failure to do so could lead to the court deciding the lines for a new map.

But Yost on Monday filed notice of an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court and requested a stay of the ruling, pending at least until the Supreme Court decides on gerrymandering cases out of North Carolina and Maryland.

Yost argued that those cases could lead to a reversal of the Ohio decision. Those cases could be decided within weeks.

The state made a similar argument earlier in unsuccessfully seeking a delay in trial, which took place in Cincinnati in March.

Advocates who brought the suit, including the Ohio League of Women Votes with representation by the American Civil Liberties Union, responded to Yost’s delay request Wednesday night.

“This Court already refused an invitation to participate in the folly of ‘predicting what the Supreme Court might do’ ... It should reject that same invitation again," the response said.

In court filings leading up the the ruling, the state said it must have a map by September of this year, in order to prepare for the 2020 election.

The judges laid out timetable to create a new map, ordering the state to “enact a remedial plan consistent” with the court’s opinion by June 14. That plan and details of how the new map was determined must be submitted by June 21. The advocates who brought the suit would then have a week to object to the new map.

The current Ohio congressional map was drawn in 2011, using 2010 census data. The Republican Party controlled the Ohio Legislature and the governor’s office then, as it does now.

The GOP designed a map capable of withstanding swings in voter sentiment to reliably elect 12 Republicans and four Democrats statewide. The results have been exactly as planned in the four elections with the map, with Republicans winning 75 percent of the races with just over half of the overall vote.

In addition to the pending U.S. Supreme Court cases from Maryland (brought by Republicans) and North Carolina (brought by Democrats), a federal judge panel in Michigan recently ordered the redrawing the lines for several Statehouse and congressional districts there.

Pennsylvania used a new congressional map last year, under order by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. The U.S. Supreme Court refused to overturn that ruling.

The U.S. Supreme Court in 1986 ruled that partisan gerrymandering could violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution, but left ambiguous the standard by which courts might rule on such claims.

Eric Heisig, federal courts reporter for cleveland.com, contributed to this story.

Rich Exner, data analysis editor for cleveland.com, writes about numbers on a variety of topics. Follow on Twitter @RichExner. Find gerrymandering-related stories at this link at on cleveland.com.