US House Redistricting: Texas
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  US House Redistricting: Texas
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BigSkyBob
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« Reply #725 on: June 01, 2012, 12:07:44 AM »

If Whites voted overwhelming for the White Democrat, and Hispanics voted mostly for the Hispanic Democrat, that seems to be "racially polarized" voting to me!

The white population in this district is a) small and b) almost certainly Republican-leaning, not participating in the Dem primary.

You have an 80+% Hispanic district in a state where Anglos are overwhelmingly Republican. If this race was 50-50, that means the Hispanic population did not vote uniformly. If the dominant community did not coalesce behind a single candidate, it's impossible to say that they didn't elect the candidate of their choice.

Conseco and O'Rourke won for the same reason: heavy White support combined with a significant minority of Hispanic support. Either something untowards has happened in both cases, or it hasn't.  What he shouldn't happen is that coalition be declared okay for a White Democrat and unacceptable for a Hispanic Republic.

Nothing untoward happened in either case. The way I see it, if there is "significant dissent" within the ranks of the minority voters, then it's okay if the "candidate of choice" of the majority of that minority loses in a VRA district. You don't see me complaining about Quico Canseco or Blake Farenthold, do you?

My point is that the DoJ did complain in Mississippi after the 1982 election, and Texas after the 2002 election. If consistency matter to the DoJ, they should complain about TX-16.

Another point is that many of Democratic posters here have claimed that the overall result must, barring extraordinary circumstances, mirror the majority of the protected minority. Nothing extraordinary occured in TX-16. If they take intellectual consistency seriously, they'd object to the outcome as well.
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minionofmidas
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« Reply #726 on: June 01, 2012, 07:13:00 AM »

How does it make any sense to still be deliberating over the maps when the congressional primaries have already taken place?
So they didn't pass an injunction against using the maps which of course means they'll probably dismiss all suits, but they haven't done that yet.

As to the question - I wouldn't doubt for a minute that what White vote there is in El Paso played a role in fashioning that winning coalition. But it's a bit questionable how much more Hispanics can be packed into the district... and anyways it, cough, borders another rather more marginally Hispanic opportunity district, and no other district whatsoever. So fixing this district would require bumping the 23rd's Hispanic share as well, presumably in San Antonio, and you would hate that. Bottom line: no one with court access has an interest in it, and thus it will not happen.
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minionofmidas
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« Reply #727 on: June 01, 2012, 08:02:36 AM »

Oh, and of course Lloyd Doggett easily survived yet another attempt by Republicans to replace him with an Hispanic (as was self-evident, really). Though in that case, Doggett presumably had majority support from Hispanics.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #728 on: June 01, 2012, 09:08:12 AM »

Again, in 1984 it was "relevant to the VRA" that a White Republican beat a Black Democrat in Mississippi in a VRA district, and 2004 it was "relevant to the VRA" that a Hispanic Republican beat a Hispanic Democrat in a VRA district. So why isn't it "relevant to the VRA" that a White Democrat beat a Hispanic Democratic in a VRA district?

The identity of the candidate doesn't matter.

Please, "regression" has everything to do with the "identity" of candidate who wins.

Nope, Gene Green's district has continued to be a protected Hispanic district despite his win. It's not as if the TX map hasn't been amply litigated over that time.
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BigSkyBob
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« Reply #729 on: June 01, 2012, 11:11:20 AM »

Again, in 1984 it was "relevant to the VRA" that a White Republican beat a Black Democrat in Mississippi in a VRA district, and 2004 it was "relevant to the VRA" that a Hispanic Republican beat a Hispanic Democrat in a VRA district. So why isn't it "relevant to the VRA" that a White Democrat beat a Hispanic Democratic in a VRA district?

The identity of the candidate doesn't matter.

Please, "regression" has everything to do with the "identity" of candidate who wins.

Nope, Gene Green's district has continued to be a protected Hispanic district despite his win. It's not as if the TX map hasn't been amply litigated over that time.

"Regression" occurs when a district held by the appropriate minority is won by a non-member, usually a White. Gene Green has nothing to do with that definition.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #730 on: June 01, 2012, 03:08:33 PM »

Again, in 1984 it was "relevant to the VRA" that a White Republican beat a Black Democrat in Mississippi in a VRA district, and 2004 it was "relevant to the VRA" that a Hispanic Republican beat a Hispanic Democrat in a VRA district. So why isn't it "relevant to the VRA" that a White Democrat beat a Hispanic Democratic in a VRA district?

The identity of the candidate doesn't matter.

Please, "regression" has everything to do with the "identity" of candidate who wins.

Nope, Gene Green's district has continued to be a protected Hispanic district despite his win. It's not as if the TX map hasn't been amply litigated over that time.

"Regression" occurs when a district held by the appropriate minority is won by a non-member, usually a White. Gene Green has nothing to do with that definition.

Nope. TN-9 hasn't regressed.
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minionofmidas
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« Reply #731 on: June 02, 2012, 06:36:23 AM »
« Edited: June 02, 2012, 06:38:01 AM by Grady Yarbrough »

Found some exit poll data (for whatever that poll is worth):

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Source: El Paso Times
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minionofmidas
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« Reply #732 on: June 02, 2012, 06:46:53 AM »

Ooh, neat.
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krazen1211
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« Reply #733 on: June 02, 2012, 10:45:52 AM »

How does it make any sense to still be deliberating over the maps when the congressional primaries have already taken place?
So they didn't pass an injunction against using the maps which of course means they'll probably dismiss all suits, but they haven't done that yet.

As to the question - I wouldn't doubt for a minute that what White vote there is in El Paso played a role in fashioning that winning coalition. But it's a bit questionable how much more Hispanics can be packed into the district... and anyways it, cough, borders another rather more marginally Hispanic opportunity district, and no other district whatsoever. So fixing this district would require bumping the 23rd's Hispanic share as well, presumably in San Antonio, and you would hate that. Bottom line: no one with court access has an interest in it, and thus it will not happen.



Well, the DOJ claims that TX-23 is not a performing district, anyway. Swapping TX-16 whites for TX-23 Hispanics would merely explicitly affirm that status.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #734 on: June 06, 2012, 09:36:58 AM »

BTW, El Paso County, TX has more than the population of a congressional district but of that population, 82.2% is Hispanic. Only 13.1% (about 100,000 people) is non-Hispanic white. At least some of them are presumably in TX-23 and not TX-16.

It looks like BSB is responding to the fact that the winner has an Irish surname, but that's not relevant to VRA. If there's racially polarized voting in El Paso, than almost definitionally it's not Anglos who are winning.

Very few, if memory serves. The state intentionally drew TX-23 to include El Paso County Hispanics, so they could balance it with Bexar County whites.

Bexar County whites are much preferred for Quico Canseco.
The line drawing in El Paso County was definitely related to TX-23.  The legislative plan, which in El Paso County is the same as the court-ordered plan, has an area in El Paso County that is 96.3% Hispanic; the vacated interim plan has made the El Paso County portion 75.5%.  The result dropped the Hispanic percentage of TX-16 by 3%.

The legislature plan has a very simple straight line boundary which comes up along I-10 in the Rio Grande Valley below the city of El Paso; while the interim court plan comes up over the north part of the city.  By dropping 20,000 Hispanics in El Paso County, they had to be made up elsewhere which rationalized their radical rejiggering of Bexar County.

Given the narrowness of O'Rourke's victory, it is quite likely that Reyes had majority support among Hispanic's.   I wouldn't be surprised that this election would be added as evidence in the redistricting case.   Dropping the district from 83% to 80% was obviously done with racist intent.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #735 on: June 06, 2012, 10:03:25 AM »

How does it make any sense to still be deliberating over the maps when the congressional primaries have already taken place?
The primaries were thrown out in both 1996 and 2006.

The last time Texas used the same districts for an entire decade was 1892-1900.

The curiosity is that the DC Circuit Court has not issued there decision on Section 5 preclearance.   Surely Section 5 is unworkable if judicial preclearance takes a year.
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BigSkyBob
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« Reply #736 on: June 06, 2012, 11:45:23 AM »

BTW, El Paso County, TX has more than the population of a congressional district but of that population, 82.2% is Hispanic. Only 13.1% (about 100,000 people) is non-Hispanic white. At least some of them are presumably in TX-23 and not TX-16.

It looks like BSB is responding to the fact that the winner has an Irish surname, but that's not relevant to VRA. If there's racially polarized voting in El Paso, than almost definitionally it's not Anglos who are winning.

Very few, if memory serves. The state intentionally drew TX-23 to include El Paso County Hispanics, so they could balance it with Bexar County whites.

Bexar County whites are much preferred for Quico Canseco.
The line drawing in El Paso County was definitely related to TX-23.  The legislative plan, which in El Paso County is the same as the court-ordered plan, has an area in El Paso County that is 96.3% Hispanic; the vacated interim plan has made the El Paso County portion 75.5%.  The result dropped the Hispanic percentage of TX-16 by 3%.

The legislature plan has a very simple straight line boundary which comes up along I-10 in the Rio Grande Valley below the city of El Paso; while the interim court plan comes up over the north part of the city.  By dropping 20,000 Hispanics in El Paso County, they had to be made up elsewhere which rationalized their radical rejiggering of Bexar County.

Given the narrowness of O'Rourke's victory, it is quite likely that Reyes had majority support among Hispanic's.   I wouldn't be surprised that this election would be added as evidence in the redistricting case.   Dropping the district from 83% to 80% was obviously done with racist intent.


Does O'Rouke's victory mean that all MALDEF has to show for its ligitation is the loss of one Hispanic Democratic Congressman?
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jimrtex
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« Reply #737 on: June 06, 2012, 02:30:31 PM »

Does O'Rouke's victory mean that all MALDEF has to show for its ligitation is the loss of one Hispanic Democratic Congressman?
They will show that Reyes is the Hispanic "candidate of choice" and that bloc voting by whites denied him renomination, and that in the past a "coalition" would vote for the Democrat in the general election.

This was the logical of the USDOJ in Kinston, NC.
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minionofmidas
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« Reply #738 on: June 07, 2012, 04:10:38 AM »

Does O'Rouke's victory mean that all MALDEF has to show for its ligitation is the loss of one Hispanic Democratic Congressman?
They will show that Reyes is the Hispanic "candidate of choice" and that bloc voting by whites denied him renomination, and that in the past a "coalition" would vote for the Democrat in the general election.
And in the future. Incidentally, O'Rourke got ~45% of the Hispanic vote according to that exit poll (hardly not a Hispanic candidate of choice as well, then) and still wouldn't have won if it wasn't for the unusually large turnout gap (which is of course the troubling/creating-a-genuine-issue part.)
In the unlikely case that it happens again exactly like that in 2014... the Hispanic candidate has a legitimate point.
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krazen1211
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« Reply #739 on: August 01, 2012, 09:18:30 AM »
« Edited: August 01, 2012, 09:21:25 AM by krazen1211 »

Texas 33rd goes 53% for Veasey (black) and Garcia (Hispanic).

http://enr.sos.state.tx.us/enr/results/july31_163_race5.htm


http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/headlines/20120801-veasey-defeats-garcia-in-new-33rd-congressional-district.ece

“Veasey did not play in Dallas like we all thought he would,” said Dallas political consultant Vinny Minchillo. “He stuck with the Fort Worth, predominantly black vote and won. ”


Garcia also waited too long to try to fire up Hispanic voters. In the last week of the campaign, he said 1.5 million Hispanics in North Texas were without representation in Congress.




Certainly Hispanics in TX-33 are not able to elect their candidate of choice in this district. This district has 84000 blacks and 287000 hispanics.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #740 on: August 01, 2012, 11:34:30 AM »

Certainly Hispanics in TX-33 are not able to elect their candidate of choice in this district. This district has 84000 blacks and 287000 hispanics.

With only 30,000 votes cast, it appears that neither candidate was the candidate of their choice. That would be "none of the above." 

This is an interesting situation.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #741 on: August 02, 2012, 01:17:30 AM »

Certainly Hispanics in TX-33 are not able to elect their candidate of choice in this district. This district has 84000 blacks and 287000 hispanics.

With only 30,000 votes cast, it appears that neither candidate was the candidate of their choice. That would be "none of the above." 

This is an interesting situation.
20,412 which was an increase from 18,868 in the primary.
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Brittain33
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« Reply #742 on: August 02, 2012, 08:54:21 AM »

Certainly Hispanics in TX-33 are not able to elect their candidate of choice in this district. This district has 84000 blacks and 287000 hispanics.

With only 30,000 votes cast, it appears that neither candidate was the candidate of their choice. That would be "none of the above." 

This is an interesting situation.
20,412 which was an increase from 18,868 in the primary.

Looks like I double counted the early votes. Wow, that's horrible turnout.
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Miles
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« Reply #743 on: August 02, 2012, 10:40:46 AM »

Changing topic, some, but just by looking at the new 36th, it seems like would be a good chance for Jon Turner to make a comeback. The core of his old 2nd is there, but it also contains eastern Harris county, which would probably be quite hostile.
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krazen1211
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« Reply #744 on: August 02, 2012, 02:11:50 PM »

Certainly Hispanics in TX-33 are not able to elect their candidate of choice in this district. This district has 84000 blacks and 287000 hispanics.

With only 30,000 votes cast, it appears that neither candidate was the candidate of their choice. That would be "none of the above." 

This is an interesting situation.
20,412 which was an increase from 18,868 in the primary.

I wonder how many of those were outside Veasey's Tarrant County house district.


Veasey, in one of the more amusing claims of the year, claims that Ted Cruz and the Republican party does not represent 'mainstream' Texas. I wonder how he came to that conclusion as Cruz will possibly hit 60% and is guaranteed 55%.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #745 on: August 05, 2012, 02:48:18 AM »

Changing topic, some, but just by looking at the new 36th, it seems like would be a good chance for Jon Turner to make a comeback. The core of his old 2nd is there, but it also contains eastern Harris county, which would probably be quite hostile.

Jim Turner?  The district is about 10% more Republican than the State, and 1/3 of the district is in Harris County.  There is a reason that there were 12 Republican candidates and 1 Democrat in the primary.

Turner is also from Crockett which is north of the district.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #746 on: August 28, 2012, 05:35:40 PM »
« Edited: August 28, 2012, 10:35:08 PM by jimrtex »

The federal district court in DC has denied preclearance to the the legislative enacted plans. Whether a plan is precleared is a true/false decision.  Part of a plan can not be precleared - even though preclearance invariable depends on specific area of a map.   And a court drawing a a plan is still required to defer to legislative policy choices to the extent that is practicable and constitutional.

Presumably, the SA district court will now go ahead and issue its ruling.  It is too late to draw a new map, and a map drawn by a federal court does not need preclearance.  So its remedial plans will be used for 2012.   It might ask for additional briefing to decide whether its plan would have been pre-cleared, and it might realize that it is wasted effort at this point.  The legislature has every right to produce a new plan.  The DC court decision will be appealed possibly directly to the SCOTUS, including a direct challenge to Section 5.  Judicial preclearance is clearly unworkable if the only options are accepting the diktats of a federal bureaucracy or have to have another court step in in order to have other elections.

Texas v United States

Congressional Plan:

Everyone agrees that TX-34 replaces TX-27 (Fahrenthold) as being a minority ability to elect district.  The numbering switch simply lets a court to opine for a few more paragraphs.

The court was decisive in that demographic data could not be used to determine whether a district was a minority ability to elect district (unless it is overwhelmingly so).  Instead, a functional analysis (based on election results) should be used.

The court seems to think endogenous results (based on results in a current district), even though this is useless for hypothetical districts.  Exogenous results are based on other elections, typically statewide races.  This can be used for both existing and hypothetical districts.

So it does not matter that the HCVAP for TX-23 (Canseco) was increased under the legislature plan.  TX-23 does not consistently elect the Hispanic candidate of choice in exogenous elections, so the court seemed to prefer the 3 elections held on the 2006 boundaries, one of which Ciro Rodriguez lost, and one of which he would have likely lost if it had been held as a regular election.   The court also found that the legislature deliberately included Hispanic voters who were more likely to vote for a Republican, thereby denying other Hispanic voters the opportunity to vote for the candidate of their choice.

The court split on whether the TX-25 (Doggett) is currently a minority ability to elect district, but agreed that TX-35 the new San Antonio-Austin district was.

So excluding TX-25, it is a new minority districts TX-34 and TX-25, and former districts TX-23 and TX-27, for no net change.  But the court in another split decision found that an additional district should have been drawn due to the increase from 32 to 36 representatives.

The court also made a finding of discriminatory intent, largely based on self-serving testimony by Democrat representatives.   Al Green (TX-9) claimed that the legislature took, "The Medical Center, Astrodome, rail line, and Houston Baptist University" out of his district, and that they would not have done that to a white Congressman.  In fact, Green retained some of the Medical Center, and Culberson (TX-7) was removed from the Medical Center as it was transferred to Jackson Lee (TX-18).  The Astrodome is likely going to be torn down.  Green only had the tail end of the rail line, and HBU can't really be considered a key economic institution.  It also moved his office out of his district, but it is on the very edge of the district, and not necessarily convenient to anyone.

Jackson Lee also had her district office moved out of her district, but it was shifted to TX-29 (Gene Green).  Her office is in the federal building downtown.  Very few people live downtown and it was just an adjustment made to balance population and make it easier to fit in TX-36 and the modified TX-2.   I see no reason why a district office has to be in a congressional district and it would be just as convenient as it is now.   Currently the office is on the edge of the district.  Because it is on a one-way street, you would have to leave the district when driving away.  It would be 1/2 block outside the district under the new map.

Presumably, the interim plan with the inclusion of the revised TX-33 would have complied with Section 5, unless the SA court had a flawed understanding of whether its TX-23 retrogressed.
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krazen1211
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« Reply #747 on: August 30, 2012, 11:26:08 AM »

For the Senate plan, the court found that SD-10 was not a protected district. It was noted that Wendy Davis relied on an extremely high 26% support from Anglos to win the district in the first place.


Incidentally, the Court seems to have upheld Pena's district as an ability district.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #748 on: August 30, 2012, 12:54:09 PM »

For the Senate plan, the court found that SD-10 was not a protected district. It was noted that Wendy Davis relied on an extremely high 26% support from Anglos to win the district in the first place.

Incidentally, the Court seems to have upheld Pena's district as an ability district.
The court's decision on the senate plan provides an additional basis for a direct challenge to Section 5.  Pages 46 to 51 essentially conclude that Texas has failed to demonstrate that they had not engaged in thought crimes.

They really had no choice on Pena's district, though it might be challenged on equal protection grounds.  There is really a pretty big variation in population which is not justifiable for political purposes (you can't deliberately underpopulate Republican districts, while you can justify variation due to conformance to political boundaries, natural or artificial features, etc.

There must have been interesting communication between the two district courts.  Texas requires the Secretary of State to set the final list of candidates for the November general election by August 27.   The DC court filed their decision on August 28.  The DC decision means that Texas can not use the districts passed by the legislature.  But they weren't going to be used, because of the interim boundaries crafted by the SA court, and now elections based on that map have been finalized.

Yapping Dog LULAC filed a motion with the SA court demanding an immediate status conference.  The SA district court responded with an order setting the status conference for tomorrow, and then added:

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It appears that it is the intent of the SA Court to wait until after the Supreme Court makes it ruling on the Section 5 appeal before it issues its opinion.   Which means that Section 5 has prevented Texas from holding its own elections, and also prevented aggrieved plaintiffs from getting relief.

Were there not Section 5, the SA court would have issued their ruling last November and it would have been under appeal.

Texas was correct to take its case to the US Supreme Court because it prevented an out of control district judge who happens to be a former Texas legislator and brother-in-law of a current legislature of drawing new maps out of whole cloth.
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jimrtex
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« Reply #749 on: August 30, 2012, 01:13:24 PM »

The DC district court has issued an order on the constitutional challenge to Section 5

"FURTHER ORDERED that the parties shall meet and confer and submit a joint proposed schedule on Claim Two (Texas’s claim that Section 5 is unconstitutional) by no later than September 13, 2012."

I don't know whether this means that Texas's appeal on the actual pre-clearance will wait on the opinion on the Section 5 procedure itself.
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