Monday’s pair of rulings paves the way for the new maps that received objections from Republicans being used for at least the 2022 election cycle as Democrats and Republicans fight for control of Congress in the midterm elections.

Conservative Justices Neil Gorsuch, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented to the ruling in the North Carolina case, while Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote a concurring opinion. Kavanaugh wrote that cases involving redistricting maps will likely continue to come to the Supreme Court until the issue is decided definitively. However, he said it makes more sense to address the issue more broadly in the Court’s next session considering that the 2022 election cycle has already begun, with candidates filed and primary elections in Texas already completed.

The dissent from Gorsuch, Thomas and Alito states that the Supreme Court should address the issue of whether state courts have the legal authority to “reject rules adopted by a state legislature for use in conducting federal elections.”

“We will have to resolve this question sooner or later, and the sooner we do so, the better. This case presented a good opportunity to consider the issue, but unfortunately the Court has again found the occasion inopportune,” the dissent states.

Republicans who brought the North Carolina case estimated that the maps ordered by their state’s Supreme Court that have now been upheld will likely give Democrats an additional seat in the House, and those in Pennsylvania said it would also likely lead to the election of more Democrats, according to the Associated Press.

The cases presented the Supreme Court with a theory that would bar state courts from ruling in cases related to elections and districting maps because the U.S. Constitution’s elections clause says that state legislatures decide the process of their own elections, according to NPR. The GOP-led legislatures have interpreted this clause to mean that only state legislatures, not state courts, can make election rules.

Analysis of the Republican-drawn North Carolina map that was rejected by state courts showed that Republicans would be favored in 10 of the state’s 14 U.S. House races for 2022, up from the eight they currently hold. The proposed map would also further solidify the majorities held by Republicans in the state House and Senate, Newsweek previously reported.

A political science researcher who testified before the North Carolina Supreme Court in January said that she created a program to generate congressional maps based on the state’s newest Census data, and said less than 3 percent of her 1,000 computer generated maps created districts where Republicans were projected to win at least 10 seats.

Update 3/7/22 6:44 p.m. ET: This story has been updated with additional context and information.