District Court, Splitting 2-1, Finds Texas Congressional Districts Violate VRA

[publicunofficial]

So far these court victories haven't won dems much. A gain of 1 seat in Virginia, a net gain of 1 seat in Florida. In North Carolina the republicans simply inserted another "gerrymander recipe" and moved on without any losses. As a result, I have little reason to believe that this will result in large dem gains.

It might have an effect in the future, where gerrymanders have to at least be creative or else they risk being struck down.

This ruling, from what I can tell, could force TX-23 to change in a way that makes it more D-leaning or could force TX-27 be drawn as a VRA seat.

[publicunofficial]

I don't even know what the court is getting at with CD-26. Unless they're mandating a third VRA district in the Dallas-FW Metro.

[publicunofficial]

Anyone have an idea as to how the new maps may look like?

Likely a total redraw of the southern part of the state, Fourth valley district would be likely.  Austin would likely also have a seat entirely in Travis county as well.  It might take out 2 or 3 republicans, depending on what they do in San Antonio. 

Maybe some rearanging of the 11 and 23.

If there's a fourth valley seat, I assume this means Farenthold's seat is dismantled, and then 15, 27, 28, and 34 are all long, tall "fajita strips"?
Yes, an Austin-anchored White district is probably going to happen. A blessing in disguise for the GOP, you can only crack it into so many pieces, and many rich, white Austin suburbanites who voted against Obama twice can't stand Trump.
With Doggett's current seat being dismantled in favor of an Austin-anchored one, I suppose this would mean a second Hispanic mostly-San Antonio seat?
Lastly, not quite sure what becomes of 23 and 11 if San Antonio. Playing around with DRA, it's hard to have 4 valley strips, 2 San Antonio seats, AND a D-leaning TX-23, but then again the numbers used are pretty old.
As for TX-26 being mentioned (I think), are they mandating a third DFW-area VRA seat, too?

I'm not sure another San Antonio seat is needed. Pull the 35th entirely into Austin, have the 20th in the center of San Antonio, have the 23rd and 28th grab the remaining Hispanic portions of the county (Having them lose population elsewhere) and then have the 21st grab the mostly white northern half the county.

[publicunofficial]

The VRA is nothing more than a money making machine for trial lawyers. If Paul Ryan had any sense, he should stand for its immediate repeal.

....And that whole pesky part about ensuring minorities get representation in government and all...

The only minority group that's discriminated against in America is Russians, don't you know?