The Court of Appeals tossed New York’s congressional maps and threw the primary season into turmoil. What’s next?

ALBANY — Election officials, candidates and lawmakers are trying to find their footing after the Court of Appeals tossed out Democrat-drawn district maps and paved the way for splitting up the state’s primaries, with the prospect of one set in June and another months later.

A court-appointed “special master” will now get a crack at crafting a new, less partisan, lineup of U.S. congressional and state senate districts as ordered by a lower court. At the same time, the state Board of Elections and the Legislature will work on selecting a potential August date for a new primary.

Primaries for U.S. Senate, governor, lieutenant governor, local offices and Assembly seats unaffected by the ruling could still be held on June 28 — unless, that is, lawmakers attempt to push them back to align with the affected races.

Michael Li, senior counsel for the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program, described the protracted court battle that came to a close on Wednesday and the current uncertainty as part of a multi-act process that’s far from over.

“There’s just a lot of pieces that have to be sorted out in order to make this work,” he said. “I don’t think anything is written in stone.”

The next step in the saga will come May 6 when Republicans, Democrats or other interested parties can present their preferred maps in court before Jonathan Cervas, a postdoctoral fellow at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh tasked with drawing up the new districts.

Cervas was appointed special master by Steuben County Supreme Court Judge Patrick McAllister, whose initial ruling against the Democrat-crafted maps came last month.

The redistricting expert, who has assisted in similar situations in other states, will then have until May 16 to submit preliminary congressional and senate maps, with final designs due on May 20, according to court documents filed Thursday.

The accelerated timeline from McAllister came hours after the Board of Elections sent the judge a letter requesting new state senate maps be finished in a timely fashion in order for it to be able meet election deadlines.

The Democratic-led Legislature, meanwhile, must figure out how to reopen the petitioning process for congressional and state senate candidates who have already been campaigning based on the now-scrapped maps. Candidates will have to gather signatures to get on the ballot once the new maps are submitted — but how many and how long they will have to do so is unclear.

Lawmakers will also likely have to approve a law splitting up the state’s primaries.

“Its still a very tight timeline no matter how you slice it,” Li told the Daily News, noting that he believes Cervas is “well positioned to be an honest broker.”

“Although he has to do this in really difficult time constraints,” Li added.

The lawsuit that led to the map mess was filed by a group of Republican voters who argued that the district boundaries crafted by the Democratic-controlled Legislature in the wake of an independent commission winding up deadlocked were unconstitutionally gerrymandered in favor of Dems.

The state’s top court agreed. In a 4-3 ruling, the Court of Appeals determined the maps were “drawn with impermissible partisan purpose.”

Ultimately, the Empire State’s final maps could have national implications as Democrats seek to maintain their slim majority in the House of Representatives in November’s midterm elections.

A similar process played out in 2012 when New York lawmakers failed to reach a consensus on congressional and state legislative lines, eventually leading to a court-appointed outsider taking over the process.

That, in turn, led to a 2014 voter-approved constitutional change meant to strip politics out of the redistricting process by delegating the power to an independent commission. The Court of Appeals ruled this week that the process laid out in the amendment was not followed correctly when the commission submitted a pair of competing maps and Democrats chose to reject them and craft their own.

State Republican Chairman Nick Langworthy said he believes the road ahead will eventually lead to more competitive maps than those drafted by Democrats earlier this year.

“The answers lie with the special master,” he said during a virtual press conference Thursday. “He has a tremendous amount of authority… to present a fair and honest map process for the people of this state.”

As for candidates caught in limbo, Langworthy said his advice would be to hold tight and focus on filling their campaign coffers.

“We would probably encourage candidates to do more fundraising than glad handing right now,” he said.

Dutchess County executive Marc Molinaro appeared to be one step ahead of his party’s leadership.

The Republican, who has been mounting a bid to unseat Congressman Antonio Delgado (D-Kingston), celebrated the court decision in an email to supporters — while soliciting donations for what is sure to be a long campaign season.

“Despite this good news, I still need your help because now we have no idea what the new map is going to look like,” Molinaro wrote.