Texas redistricting plan ruled illegal

WASHINGTON — A federal judicial panel derailed the Texas redistricting plan Tuesday, finding the maps violate the Voting Rights Act by diluting minority voting strength and discriminating against Hispanics and African Americans.

Texas failed to show the new political lines were “not enacted with discriminatory purpose” when passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature, the court ruled.

“This is absolutely a victory for Texas and for minority voters to elect a candidate of their choice,” said Trey Martinez Fischer, chairman of the Mexican American Legislative Caucus, which opposed the redistricting plans.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott immediately said he would “appeal this flawed decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.”

Abbott claimed the panel overstepped constitutional bounds and expanded Voting Rights Act protections with its decision.

He said the ruling would not affect upcoming elections, because it applies to the redistricting plans drawn by the state Legislature, and not interim redistricting plans approved by a separate San Antonio federal court panel.

The San Antonio federal court panel, hearing other legal challenges to the plans, drew the interim maps for the upcoming Nov. 6 elections. Those maps were agreed to by the state and minority groups.

Abbott said the November elections for congressional, state House and Senate seats would “proceed as planned under the interim maps drawn by the federal court in San Antonio.”

Circuit Court Judge Thomas Griffith, wrote for the three-judge federal panel. He was joined by District Judges Rosemary Collyer and Beryl Howell in the 154-page ruling released Tuesday by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

Minority-rights groups still were digesting the inch-thick ruling and could seek expanded relief from the San Antonio federal panel prior to the election, said José Garza, counsel for the Mexican American Legislative Caucus.

State lawmakers also could seek to redraw the maps when they return to a legislative session in January, Garza said.

Others said the extensive ruling by the three-judge panel would hamper Abbott's efforts to appeal the case to the Supreme Court on grounds that protections under the Voting Rights Act no longer were needed in Texas.

Texas is one of several Southern states that must receive pre-approval, or “preclearance,” from the Justice Department to any changes in voting procedures under the Voting Rights Act because of a past history of racial discrimination.

Abbott filed suit seeking a declaratory ruling by the three-judge panel to bypass Justice Department preclearance and install the state redistricting plans.

Abbott argued the new districts did not discriminate against Hispanics or African Americans, but were instead drawn to consolidate Republican power.

“Today's decision extends the Voting Rights Act beyond the limits intended by Congress and beyond the boundaries imposed by the Constitution,” Abbott said.

But the three-judge panel found in its ruling that the state failed to uphold its legal burden to show the new maps did not discriminate

The redistricting plans were drawn against a backdrop of Hispanic population growth.

Texas grew by 4 million people over the past decade. Minorities accounted for 90 percent of the growth. Latinos accounted for 65 percent alone, according to the U.S. census.

The state's congressional delegation grew by four, from 32 seats to 36 seats, but the outcome of the new redistricting map made it likely that no additional minority lawmakers would have been elected.

And changes to existing minority-opportunity districts confounded the judges.

The Voting Rights Act allows the state to create political districts that give a majority of a minority group the opportunity to elect a candidate of their choice.

The Legislature removed the Alamo and the Convention Center in downtown San Antonio from the minority-opportunity district of Rep. Charlie Gonzalez, D-San Antonio.

“No such surgery was performed on the districts of Anglo incumbents,” Griffith wrote in the ruling.

Instead, the judges noted that Republicans protected the inclusion of a San Antonio country club in the district of Rep. Lamar Smith, a Republican.

The court said “economic engines,” hospitals and universities were taken out of African American congressional districts in Houston.

Latino and minority voting strength was diluted or reduced in three congressional districts, the judges ruled.

Those seats are held by Rep. Francisco “Quico” Canseco, R-San Antonio; Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin; and Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Corpus Christi.

Meanwhile, state lawmakers held out hope that a majority of the Supreme Court would side with Texas on an appeal.

State Sen. Kel Seliger, R-Amarillo, who chaired the Senate redistricting committee which drew the new lines, said the judicial panel only found that Texas failed to prove that the maps would not discriminate.

Seliger said the ruling that the state weakened the ability of Latinos to elect a candidate of their choice “was very much in dispute and will be part and parcel of the Supreme Court case.”

Nolan Hicks and Peggy Fikac contributed to this report.

gmartin@express-news.net