{"id":1047,"date":"2004-01-07T12:15:58","date_gmt":"2004-01-07T17:15:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/1047.html"},"modified":"2004-01-07T12:15:58","modified_gmt":"2004-01-07T17:15:58","slug":"discouraging-news-on-the-gops-re-redistricting-scheme-in-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/discouraging-news-on-the-gops-re-redistricting-scheme-in-texas\/","title":{"rendered":"Discouraging news on the GOP’s re-redistricting scheme in Texas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Democrats in the Texas Legislature did everything they could think of to block Tom DeLay’s re-redistricting scheme in Texas, up to and including fleeing the state and hiding in Oklahoma and New Mexico to deny a quorum to vote on DeLay’s plan over the summer.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, however, the plan passed and Democrats played the only card they had left: they went to court. The argument was simple: the new congressional district map was in conflict with the Voting Rights Act because it intentionally undermined the influence of minority voters — African American and Latinos — in Texas<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, a three-judge panel for the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the Texas GOP yesterday<\/a>, concluding that the Republicans’ intent in redrawing the map was to advance a partisan cause, not to discriminate along racial and\/or ethnic lines. The ruling will probably end the controversy and will offer Republicans at least six new lawmakers in Congress in this year’s elections.<\/p>\n

The judges appeared vaguely sympathetic to the Dems’ concerns, noting that the decision was based purely on the fact that the judges didn’t see an inconsistency between the newly-drawn map and the Voting Rights Act. “We decide only the legality of [the plan], not its wisdom,” the decision said.<\/p>\n

Gov. Rick Perry (R) said the decision “validates the actions taken by the Texas Legislature.” I don’t think he read the ruling. Indeed, the panel seemed to acknowledge that Democrats were right to condemn this hyper-partisan boondoggle and encouraged Congress to prohibit states from drawing new maps mid-decade as Texas had done.<\/p>\n

“Whether the Texas Legislature has acted in the best interest of Texas is a judgment that belongs to the people,” the judges wrote. “We are compelled to conclude that this plan was a political product from start to finish.”<\/p>\n

Adding an unfortunate partisan tint to the 5th Circuit’s ruling, the appeals court was split 2 to 1 on the case — the two in the majority were appointed by Republican presidents (Reagan and the first Bush), while the minority was a Clinton appointee.
\n
\nThe Dems will now appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, but no one seems to believe the high court will consider the case.<\/p>\n

The Houston Chronicle, which has never seemed particularly fond of the re-redistricting fight, had a terrific editorial today<\/a> noting that “just because the redistricting is legal…does not make it right.”<\/p>\n

“Lawyers for the state argued that the systematic dilution of minority voting strength is not illegal if its aim is partisan advantage rather than racial discrimination,” the Chronicle noted. “The federal judges agreed, but that cynical assertion resembles the idea that it is OK to trample on people for personal gain as long as you don’t look down to see what’s happening. It might be legal, but it is not just.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Democrats in the Texas Legislature did everything they could think of to block Tom DeLay’s re-redistricting scheme in Texas, up to and including fleeing the state and hiding in Oklahoma and New Mexico to deny a quorum to vote on DeLay’s plan over the summer. Ultimately, however, the plan passed and Democrats played the only […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1047\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}