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

[Gass3268]

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Also it was ruled intentional, which means if upheld by the Supreme Court Texas would go under Section 5 pre-clearance.

[Gass3268]

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.

This is a huge ruling if Democrats take back the White House in 2020. The court ruled that Texas' map was discriminatory in both practice and intent. If the intent part is upheld, Texas will fall into Section 5 preclearance, meaning the DOJ would have to approve any changes to Texas election/voting laws, like decennial redistricting,

[Gass3268]

Could someone who's knowledgeable about this explain why CD's 15, 28, and 34 are drawn as three long north-south strips rather than three compact districts?

Illegal packing of Hispanics

[Gass3268]

So after reading the court order, it seems they decided:

1. There needs to be 7 HCVAP majority districts in south/west Texas

2.  They don't consider the current TX-23 to be a performing district for hispanics and it needs to be made performing

3.  Nueces county must be put into a HCVAP majority district.  

4.  CD-35 must be removed from Travis county....? To make it more compact?  (Not sure on this, I guess they're saying a second HCVAP district in Bexar county alone?).   TX-21 would be the obvious target to fill in what's left empty in Travis.   

So those changes would pretty much force 2 districts entirely within Bexar, 1 district most likely entirely within Travis, TX-23 be made more hispanic (and dem),  and TX-34 would take in Nueces, resulting in big changes to TX-27.

Did I get this right..?

Plus maybe another minority opportunity district in the DFW area.