RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- Groups challenging Republican-drawn redistricting maps before the N.C. Supreme Court are pushing for the recusal of a conservative justice who won reelection with the aide of nearly $2 million in political ads paid for by GOP-aligned organizations.

A legal motion filed Wednesday says Justice Paul Newby should recuse himself from deciding the redistricting case because the outsized partisan spending on his reelection campaign undermines his impartiality. State judicial races are technically non-partisan, but Newby is a registered Republican whose reelection relied heavily on support from some of the same GOP leaders named as defendants in the redistricting lawsuit.

The North Carolina chapter of the NAACP and others have sued top Republican lawmakers over 2011 congressional and state legislative maps the left-leaning groups contend are illegally gerrymandered to favor GOP candidates.