COLUMBUS - A day after a federal court said it would not intervene for another six weeks in Ohio's legislative redistricting process, Republicans on the Ohio Redistricting Commission did not have much to say Thursday about what the next steps look like.

The federal court said Wednesday if the state didn't have a resolution by May 28, it would implement a pair of maps the Ohio Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional and order the General Assembly to hold its primary on August 2.

The only thing Republican commissioners, through their spokespeople, are saying is "we're reviewing the decision." An Ohio House GOP spokesperson told Spectrum News 1 he would provide updates when they are available.

Democratic Senator Vernon Sykes, D-Akron, sent a second letter Thursday along with House Minority Leader Allison Russo, D-Upper Arlington, calling for commissioners to reconvene and draw maps for a fifth time, but there's been no response from Republicans. They said remote options are on the table, considering Governor Mike DeWine, R-Ohio, has COVID.

They also said Commission should re-hire the independent mapmakers, give them space to continue their work and publicly broadcast it on the Ohio Channel like before.​

Leader Russo spoke with Spectrum News 1 virtually about the court's decision. She said regardless of what the federal court says it will do six weeks from now, the Ohio Supreme Court gave the commission a May 6 deadline to draw new maps and that is what she plans on doing.

"We are under both a constitutional obligation and a court order to convene and draw maps. So, you know, if Republicans want to ignore the court and defy the rule of law, that is a very disturbing path that they will take or may take. But again, the court has many remedies that it can prescribe to ensure that this process is followed," said Russo.

When asked specifically what remedies she was talking about, she said contempt of court. That is something that has been brought up twice before the Ohio Supreme Court, but a hearing has never been scheduled in either instance.

Meanwhile, getting back to the court's decision, the judges said they would implement the third maps passed by the commission. Those maps, again, were ruled unconstitutional because the majority of Ohio Supreme Court justices said they unfairly favored Republicans.

As far as the legality for that to happen, Professor Emeritus of Law Jonathan Entin at Case Western Reserve University said there is no precedence for what the three-judge panel ruled Wednesday. He said what you typically see a federal court say is certain legislative maps could be unconstitutional under the federal Constitution and then the federal court orders its own map drawing. But that is not what happened here.

"Ohio wouldn't be in this situation, except that the voters amended the state constitution to reform the redistricting process to try to reduce the prospect of partisan gerrymandering. That's been tried in some other states as well. But as I said, these are all fairly recent developments. So the fact that we haven't seen federal courts adopting maps that the state Supreme Court found to be unconstitutional, we haven't had that many situations where that situation could have arisen," said Entin.

But what are the chances the decision could be appealed and who would hear it?

Jen Miller with the League of Women Voters of Ohio, a plaintiff in the state supreme court litigation, said her organization is still reviewing the decision and its next steps. So it is unclear.

The U.S. Supreme Court would hear the appeal, if it chooses to, because the three-judge panel in U.S. District Court contained a judge from the U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. Therefore, it would bypass the circuit court altogether and go straight to the top court.

However, considering the current conservative makeup of the court, Professor Entin doubts the decision would get overturned.

"I think the current Supreme Court has already given some indication that it does not want federal courts messing around too much with state election processes too close to the election," Entin said.

Entin is referring to the situation where the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on a congressional redistricting case involving Alabama. Despite there being constitutional concerns with that map, the court said it was too late to order a new map this year. So he said based on that, he does not think the U.S. Supreme Court would require the district court to come up with different legislative maps beyond the third maps they said they would impose on May 28.