Texas: CD35, CD27 found unconstitutional; "intentional racial discrimination"

[Nyvin]

Great news!

I am going to draw a new map to fortify TX-07 and TX-32 while also preserving the GOP districts.

The courts strike down districts in Corpus Christi and Austin....and Krazen thinks that means redrawing districts in Houston and Dallas....

[Nyvin]

TX-23 getting a pass isn't much of a loss considering it's already winnable for Dems anyway.

TX-35 is probably the big game changer in this since Travis county is split between so many districts.   

[Nyvin]

So are they literally just making districts for one term and then new ones AGAIN?

Two terms, but yeah it's a travesty how long this Court took to work through this case.

What's really terrible about it is that it encourages the national parties to push state legislatures to gerrymander the hell out the maps in the next redistricting since the corrections by the courts take such a long time to process anyway that they basically get 2-3 free elections with rigged maps.

[Nyvin]

Would something like this work? It looks much cleaner than the current and I made sure there are plenty of Hispanic majority districts too

CD-16 (El Paso) 80% Hisp. Obama by 31
CD-23 (Big Bend) 76% Hisp. Obama by 0.4
CD-15 (Laredo) 91% Hisp. Obama by 40
CD-34 (Brownsville) 90% Hisp. Obama by 37
CD-27 (Corpus Christi) 58% Hisp. McCain by 8
CD-20 (South San Antonio) 78% Hisp. Obama by 34
CD-28 (North San Antonio) 47% Hisp. McCain by 2
CD-35 (Austin) 41% Hisp. 30% Hips. Obama by 46

There needs to be 7 hispanic majority districts.

[Nyvin]

The portion of Travis in TX-35 is mostly Hispanics.

Interesting. It seems dumping those voters into Farenthold's Anglo district just as it sheds Hispanic voters in Nueces would make this map DOA when it hits the courts.

Exactly, what good does it do to move hispanics out of one part of the district just to add them to another part up north?   That's completely ridiculous.

Also,  I just put together the TX-27 district that Jimrtex described and I only achived about 48% hispanic,  so I'm wondering where exactly the 7th hispanic majority district will be.

[Nyvin]

The option that makes the most sense to me for TX-35 is to have TX-35 moved entirely within Bexar and then move TX-21 out of Bexar and move it into Travis as much as possible.   

I would think the Legislature is going to do something along those lines.

[Nyvin]

Pwned. 5-4!

Losers of elections are going to have a tough time stealing the districts.

Link

BREAKING: #SCOTUS stays Texas redistricting case order, pending appeal to and disposition in the Supreme Court.

They just stayed the decision until a final ruling is made,  it doesn't affect much, except that the district won't go into effect right away.

[Nyvin]

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/8/16/1690288/-Court-strikes-down-Texas-GOP-s-congressional-gerrymander-but-Democratic-victory-is-limited

DKos estimates it'll be at most a net 1 for Democrats, but even that's no guaranteed. I really don't get why they emphasize that the new representative will most likely be Latino. No wonder the white working class hates the left: this is blatant identity politics.

Ah yes, the white working class hate that the minorities will have a chance to elect people of their own race.  Very progressive of them.

You don't need a majority minority district to elect a minority candidate. See SC-Sen, UT-4, TX-23 is 75% Hispanic and they have a black representative. People don't necessarily vote based on who looks like them. I mean for next year, I'm a Hispanic college student supporting a black candidate for NH-1

"increasing minority representation" means increasing minorities' ability to choose representatives, not increasing the number of minorities in Congress.

This is so annoying when people just equate a minority district to having minority representatives....sheesh!