(Legal Defense Fund) – The saying goes, “I can do bad by myself.” This means I can do enough damage to myself, I don’t need your help. It was a theme heard again and again by the throngs of witnesses during the recent Texas House of Representatives’ congressional redistricting committee hearings. And it’s a theme that will continue to echo through the Statehouse halls, as state legislators shamelessly move this map to the House floor – with no regard for the consequences it will bring down upon Texans.
Some state representatives, who still prioritize the protection of civil rights for all Texans over political games haphazardly played with Texans’ right to equal representation, even left the state this weekend, breaking quorum in an attempt to halt this disastrous map from moving forward.
When the governor announced his special 30-day legislative session agenda, which called back state legislators to Austin in July, one of many agenda items was the redistricting of the state’s congressional district map. This map determines to which district voters are assigned and ultimately from what pool of candidates they get to choose their federal congressional representatives.
Black, Hispanic, Asian Pacific Islander and White Texans approached the hearing’s microphone one after the other, crying out for their state elected officials to overcome federal pressure because the state has a history of doing bad by itself when it comes to racial issues.
Texas doesn’t need to be divided by outsiders inserting their own racial divisions. In a recent letter from the Justice Department to Governor Abbott, the administration expressed its desire for Texas to redraw its congressional district map because, in their words, the current one illegally considered race. But this flies in the face of Texas Attorney General Paxton’s own words, when he defended the prior congressional map as being drawn solely for political reasons and other non-racial reasons like respecting traditional redistricting principles. Notably, the creation of voting maps based on political reasons is not necessarily prohibited under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act or the Constitution – unless it’s Black voters that are harmed in that pursuit.
In this instance, the Justice Department’s letter to the governor pointed out four districts (9, 18, 29 and 33) that should be reconsidered. Not surprisingly, they all are currently “majority minority” districts – a term used by courts which means most eligible voters in the district are Black and Brown. The long-time term has been used by courts even though people of color now make up the majority of the population in Texas.
These four districts include the Houston and Dallas areas with seats covered by representatives Al Green, Sylvia Garcia, the late Sylvester Turner, and Marc Veasey – all Black and Hispanic elected officials. In short, the Texas Legislature is considering changing the state’s congressional map in the middle of the decade, fewer than four years after the current map, which also is flawed, was created. This current move will hurt Black voters and other voters of color, even more than the existing map already does, if the map is redrawn in a way that fails to protect their voting power. The Legal Defense Fund and our partners believe this process is both deeply unfair and extremely unnecessary.
Black voters in historic districts like 9 and 18 have long been assigned districts that reflect “communities of interest” allowing them to elect candidates of their choice and to be represented in Congress by officials who know and understand their communities. Those congressionally elected officials have included none other than the late Barbara Jordan and Sheila Jackson Lee. As one hearing witness testified, Jackson Lee understood when residents complained about the multiple batched plants in their community and the need for Environmental Protection Agency engagement. Another witness testified that the possibility of a map that takes race into account solely to gain more votes in Congress would very likely create districts that are even more “cracked” and place rural areas in far off urban areas, thereby silencing voters’ voices with representation by someone who doesn’t live near or understand rural concerns.
During the Texas House’s hearings, no single state legislator on either side of the aisle, including the committee’s chair, complained that the current map violates the Voting Rights Act or U.S. Constitution by illegally considering race. In fact, in 2021, Texas claimed it drew its congressional map without considering voters’ race and based its decisions only on political data and traditional redistricting rules. If race wasn’t used in 2021, there should be no reason to redraw the map now in a way that could further weaken the power of Black communities. Even more troubling, courts are still deciding whether the 2021 map was unlawful, so rushing to change the map now, in the middle of years of litigation, could make things worse, not better.
This redistricting process is happening too quickly and without transparency. State legislators only shared their proposed map after the hearings concluded – conducting the entirety of the public hearings with no chance for anyone to fully comment on the actual substance of the map. With only 30 days allowed in a special session (and nearly a third of that already expired), there’s simply not enough time for proper review or public input in a process that should be treated with the utmost care and respect. This redistricting sham puts thousands of voters at risk of being barred from our democracy.
Instead of rushing a redistricting process that is primed to take away fair representation, the Legislature should prioritize disaster relief for recent flood survivors and take the time to correct flaws already shown in the existing map. What’s at stake is more than just lines on a map. It’s the right of Black and Brown voters to have the opportunity to elect candidates of their choice who will understand their needs when they seek help with community matters such as schools, housing, disaster relief, health care, jobs, social security, veteran and immigration concerns, and environmental justice. Because after decades of underinvestment, redlining and multiple forms of racial discrimination against Black and Brown communities, Texas can do bad by itself; it doesn’t need help from the federal government.
Simply put in the way I learned while growing up in Dallas, “DON’T MESS WITH TEXAS.”
To learn more about redistricting, visit https://www.naacpldf.org/redistricting-report/.
Demetria McCain currently serves as director of Policy for the Legal Defense Fund.