A closely watched Texas election case resumed Tuesday, with Republican officials challenging a federal law they say has been “twisted” to benefit Democratic candidates.
Lawyers for GOP-controlled Galveston County claimed to the New Orleans-based US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that their 2021 redistricting plan, which broke up a Democrat-held, majority-black and Hispanic precinct, is lawful under the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965.
So-called “coalition districts” are meant to protect the rights of racial and ethnic minority voters who make up a majority of the population in a certain area, and their constitutionality has been upheld by federal courts.
Galveston County Judge Mark Henry told The Post the rejiggered Galveston precinct, which is now 38.6% black and Hispanic, had been one of nearly a dozen in the South that have been racially gerrymandered for “political gain.”
“Looking at the demographic breakdown of congressional seats in just the South, you’ll find nearly a dozen coalition districts from Texas all the way over to Florida and the Carolinas,” said Henry, who also functions as the county’s chief executive officer.
“If we are successful in our argument about coalition districts, then Republican-led states can revisit their maps, not just at the congressional level, but at the state and local level as early as next year,” he added.
“Regardless of the result at the Fifth, there will be a circuit split. We expect whoever loses at the Fifth Circuit will seek Supreme Court review to settle this issue nationwide.”
At least five other coalition House districts are currently represented in Texas by Democrats, most famously downtown Houston’s 18th Congressional District long held by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee.
Republicans currently control the House by just four votes, 217-213, with five vacancies.
Not all GOP officials are in agreement about the sweeping implications of the case, pointing out that the Supreme Court already weighed in on the matter in 2008’s Bartlett v. Strickland decision.
In that case, the high court voted 5-4 to strike down a North Carolina state legislative map that included a district that was 39% black. The justices ruled that the Voting Rights Act did not compel the creation of a coalition district unless a minority group makes up an absolute majority of the adult population in a particular area.
Adam Kincaid, executive director of the National Republican Redistricting Trust, told The Post that the current Fifth Circuit case was “an outlier” and would likely align with the Bartlett precedent rather than be heard by the Supreme Court.
“The question is really: ‘What does the VRA require?’ Not: ‘What may a jurisdiction draw?’” Kincaid explained. “Galveston could have drawn a coalition district, but the VRA doesn’t require it.”
Only an “aggressive ruling” from the Fifth Circuit outlawing coalition districts altogether would lead to jurisdictions besides Galveston being redrawn, he added.
President Biden’s Justice Department sued Galveston County in March 2022, alleging that its new district map violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by discriminating against black and Hispanic voters.
The DOJ’s suit, which was joined by plaintiffs for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), prevailed in a federal district court last year, forcing Galveston to adopt a new district map before the 2024 election.
In an October ruling, US District Judge Jeffrey Vincent Brown, an appointee of former President Donald Trump, called the 2021 district map “a clear violation” of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.
Attorneys for Galveston appealed that decision to the Fifth Circuit, which held initial hearings before imposing a stay in December on the district ruling.
Attorneys for the civil rights groups accused county officials in oral arguments before the Fifth Circuit last year of having “wiped off the map Galveston’s sole and historic majority-minority precinct.”
But the panel of circuit signaled support for the GOP officials’ case, noting the district court’s decision to ignore minority candidates already elected under the new map, including Galveston Commissioner Robin Armstrong, who is black and won office as a Republican in 2022.
“At the end of the day, plaintiffs would read [Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act] to require race-based redistricting with no logical endpoint,” the Fifth Circuit panel wrote in its December order granting the initial stay. “The County has shown a likelihood of success in arguing that is unlawful.”
The Supreme Court declined to intervene in the case in December pending a full, or en banc, hearing before the Fifth Circuit.
“The Voting Rights Act was meant to right wrongs. It wasn’t meant to subsidize political parties with legislative seats,” attorney J. Christian Adams, who is representing Galveston, told The Post. “That’s what this case is about — the real meaning of the Voting Rights Act, or, how it has been twisted by coalition districts.”
County officials have also cited several voter enfranchisement efforts on their part, including providing election materials in English and Spanish and even paying to host LULAC’s annual get-out-the-vote event.
“The Biden DOJ’s decision to sue Galveston County is yet another blunder that could ultimately lead to hamstringing the Democratic Party’s ability to control Congress,” Henry concluded. “They picked this fight.”
A ruling by the full Fifth Circuit in the case, Petteway v. Galveston County, is expected later this year.