CNN
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A county redistricting plan in Texas that a judge appointed by President Donald Trump found to be a “clear violation” of the Voting Rights Act is back before an appeals court known for its conservative leanings.
But despite a big early victory for Black and Hispanic voters and the Biden administration, which joined minority voters in suing over the maps, civil rights advocates say the ruling would significantly undermine the Voting Rights Act. I am concerned that this judgment will be overturned. southern belt.
For nearly 30 years, the 3rd District of the Board of County Commissioners, Galveston County’s governing body, was drawn to group together the black and Hispanic communities that make up nearly 39% of the county’s population and mostly vote Democratic. It has been. After the 2021 Census, the Republican-led county commission split the district and instead established four majority-white districts.
U.S. District Judge Jeffrey Vincent Brown last year called the commissioners’ methods of “erasing” majority-minority districts “cold,” “disgusting,” “egregious,” and “nasty,” calling the new Dismissed the map.
Among the commission’s actions were holding its only meeting on the redistricting plan 44 miles away from the county courthouse, where major commission meetings are normally held, and holding the only meeting on the redistricting plan 44 miles away from the county courthouse, where major commission meetings are usually held This included excluding Democrats from the map-making process. .
But in an eyebrow-raising procedural maneuver by the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals last year, the Supreme Court declined to intervene, leaving the 5th Circuit to consider reversing election results for 35 years. Therefore, the disputed map will become effective from the 2024 election. – an old precedent on which the Brown decision was based.
On Tuesday, a conservative appeals court will hear arguments to determine whether the Voting Rights Act requires redistricting plans to protect the collective political power of multiple minority groups, known as “coalition districts.” .
Lawyers leading the lawsuit told CNN that the case shows exactly why the Voting Rights Act contemplates scenarios in which a coalition of ethnic groups would be harmed by discriminatory map drawing. he said. Overturning current precedent, they say, would prompt mapmakers across the South to divide majority and minority districts made up of multiple ethnic or racial groups.
“What’s at stake here is recognizing that communities of color often suffer the effects of discrimination together,” said the Campaign Legal Center, which represents voters challenging the maps. General Counsel Valencia Richardson said.
Opponents argue that Congress did not intend for multiple “classes” of minorities to be considered together when evaluating maps for compliance with the Voting Rights Act. They argue that the confederate district requirement has further exacerbated the endless litigation surrounding redistricting.
“At the heart of this case is the meaning of the Voting Rights Act. Either it’s about restoring justice and putting things back where they belong, or it’s about politics that unfairly uses race to distribute power.” Is it a weapon?” Galveston County attorney J. Christian Adams said in an email to CNN.
Black and Latino voices ‘disappeared’, judge says
The 2021 map split the long-established Third Precinct, spreading minority voters across a total of four commission precincts. White voters in the county, who vote overwhelmingly Republican, currently hold significant majorities in all four districts.
“Looking at the totality of the circumstances, as this court does, it is clear that the county will not be able to properly represent Black and Latino communities in County Commissioners Court during the 2021 redistricting process,” Brown wrote in his decision. It’s amazing how the voice was completely erased.”
Brown, who was confirmed by the Senate with only Republican support in 2019, has previously ruled against the Biden administration in legal disputes over federal coronavirus vaccination mandates and environmental regulations. There is.
The 2021 redistricting was the first time the county was exempt from so-called preclearance under the Voting Rights Act. The law required local governments with a history of racist voting practices to get approval from the Department of Justice or federal courts when adopting new political maps.
Brown pointed to how the commission’s Republican members, led by the county’s chief executive, County Judge Mark Henry, deviated from the county’s normal redistricting process in a number of ways.
Galveston Republicans chose to shut out the public and the committee member representing the 3rd Precinct, who was the only Democrat on the committee and the only person of color at the time, from much of the process, the lawsuit says. The official approved. The commission chose to hold only one public meeting on the redistricting plan, compared to the five it held after the 2010 Census.
This only meeting held in 2021 was also held in a much smaller, more difficult-to-access building 44 miles outside of Galveston, rather than the centrally located county courthouse typically used for major committee business. Ta. An estimated 150 to 200 people attended the rally, but many, including the elderly and people in wheelchairs, remained lined up in the hallways due to lack of space.
Brown wrote that at the meeting, Henry and other commissioners showed “a disregard for public input from minority communities and those critical of the discriminatory effects of the enacted plan.”
A second Black lawmaker joined the commission in 2022, filling a seat vacated by the death of a Republican lawmaker representing a district of predominantly white voters. New commissioner Robin Armstrong is a Republican. A federal judge in the redistricting case said his addition to the commission was unrelated to the legal dispute.
“His district is predominately Anglo, and several witnesses, including Secretary Armstrong himself, testified that he was not the candidate that black and Latino voters would choose,” the judge said. Armstrong did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.
If the appellate court reverses precedent and rules against the coalition mandate, such a decision would be deeply affected in the three states covered by the circuit: Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. It will be. A 2013 Supreme Court ruling invalidated that mandate.
“The Fifth Circuit should make clear that race cannot be used for political gain,” Adams, who is also president and general counsel of the Public Interest Law Foundation, told CNN in an email. He pointed out that the court in “does not recognize these minority claims.” district. ”
“The law speaks in singular terms, not in aggregations of minority groups,” he said.
Challengers to Galveston’s new map asked the Supreme Court last year to block their 2021 plans for the upcoming election after the 5th Circuit stayed the Brown decision, but the request It was rejected by a dissenting opinion of three liberal justices.
The 5th Circuit “has gone far beyond its original authority,” the appellate court said, “found to be in violation of existing law … based on the theory that circuits could change at some point.” , Justice Elena Kagan, joined by two other liberals on the court, wrote. That law. ”
The current 5th Circuit’s precedent for recognizing confederated districts dates back to 1988.
At trial in the Galveston case, challengers must prove that black and Hispanic voters have a common history of suffering discrimination in the county and have consistently voted for the same candidates. There wasn’t.
“If racial groups lack cohesion derived from common experiences and interests, their claims will naturally fail. There is no need to anticipate the outcome,” the Justice Department wrote in its ruling to the court. written in the submitted document.
The county contends that Galveston’s Latino and Black populations are individually too small and that the lawsuit must fail for a successful VRA claim.
“There was no indication in the language or history of the VRA that the VRA was intended to protect two or more minority groups together when they cannot be claimed individually,” the court filing said. ” he said.
Chad Ennis, vice president of the conservative group that works on voting issues and is a friend of the court brief seeking to eliminate coalition districts, told CNN that the legal dispute over coalition districts is In the end, he said, it will be a “battle.” Among the experts. ”
Ennis said current case law is fueling a long legal battle over redistricting.
“What I’m trying to think about is, ‘Can we do this together?’ [multiple groups] together? Should I group them together? “It becomes very difficult,” he said.
Supporters of the Fifth Circuit’s precedent say that Galveston shows how rare it is for these types of coalition claims to succeed in the first place, and that this dispute is an example of the kind of discrimination that the VRA sought to address. It states that it is an example of an action.
“If the defendants have their way, it would effectively greenlight the destruction of majority-minority neighborhoods throughout the South,” said the Southern Social Justice Coalition, a senior adviser to some of the challengers in the case. said Hilary Harris Klein. “Just as it was devastating for Black and Latino voters in Galveston, it will be devastating for minority voters.”
