Latino legal rights group files suit against Texas redistricting maps — before they’re final

AUSTIN — As the GOP-led Legislature finalizes new political maps that would cement Republicans’ grip on power for the next decade, a Latino legal rights organization on Monday sued state officials over the redrawn boundaries.

The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund argued the maps violate the federal Voting Rights Act and dilute the voting strength of Hispanic voters, according to the federal lawsuit.

In their suit against Gov. Greg Abbott and Deputy Texas Secretary of State Jose A. Esparza filed in federal court in El Paso, the legal team representing a coalition of Latino organizations asked the federal court to toss out the new maps.

“Despite having only recently been found liable by a federal court for intentional racial discrimination in redistricting, Texas has once again adopted plans that dilute Latino voting strength,” Nina Perales, MALDEF’s vice president of litigation, said in a news release. “The new redistricting plans are an unlawful attempt to thwart the changing Texas electorate and should be struck down.”

Abbott’s office could not immediately be reached for comment.

The plaintiffs argued the new maps for the U.S. House, Texas House, Texas Senate and State Board of Education do not reflect the growth of the Hispanic community.

People of color have fueled the state’s population boom over the last decade, with much of the growth concentrated in cities and suburban areas, census data show. Yet, the proposed congressional map fails to expand the clout of nonwhite voters who powered the state’s surge.

Domingo Garcia, national president of the League of United Latin American Citizens, said it is “blatant discrimination” that GOP mapmakers did not create a new U.S. house district where Hispanic voters can elect the candidate of their choice – for example, in the Dallas metro area.

“[Dallas is] the largest metro area in the entire United States without a Latino congressional opportunity district,” Garcia, a former state representative from Dallas, said at a Tuesday press conference. “The Republican party has weaponized political gerrymandering to disenfranchise and to suppress the vote of Latinos throughout the state of Texas.”

This is not the first legal challenge to this year’s redistricting process. Two Democratic state senators filed a lawsuit in early September to block the Legislature from redistricting in a special session this year. The senators argued that the Texas Constitution requires that redistricting be done in a regular session that won’t happen until 2023.

The plaintiffs in Monday’s suit include the League of United Latin American Citizens, Southwest Voter Registration Education Project and Mi Familia Vota, among other organizations and individual voters.

In another legal development Monday, the Mexican American Legislative Caucus filed a petition for deposition to investigate potential violations of the Texas Open Meetings Act. The organization said it wants to depose Adam Foltz, a secretive GOP operative who appears to be on the Texas Legislature payroll, helping with Republican lawmakers’ redraw.

MALC argues in the petition that “even if Foltz is simply a secret employee of the House Redistricting Committee, his communications with only certain members of the legislature raise serious issues about an opaque process designed to fashion legislation shielded from the eyes of the public and minimize participation by minority communities.”