Ashcroft OKs remapping plan: Partisan politics, foes say
The Justice Department's preclearance decision is a critical first step to a swift implementation of the state's congressional plan -- a plan that reflects rather than frustrates current Texas voting trends.
- Greg Abbott, Texas Attorney General
The Bush-Ashcroft Justice Department has been the most political ever to oversee the administration of civil rights.
- J. Gerald Hebert
The Voting Rights Act has been hijacked by the political ideologues. A clearly retrogressive, discriminatory plan has been approved by the Justice Department to further the political agenda of the White House regardless of its impact on minority voters.
- Brent Wilkes, national LULAC president
As I was reading this piece, I could hear the voice of Claude Rains screaming in my head ("I AM SHOCKED- SHOCKED THAT THERE IS GAMBLING TAKING PLACE...."). A slash-and-burn Republican approving a Congressional redistrcting map that will give Republicans absolute hegemony in Texas? I know, I was shocked as well, but this is the reality that is being shoved down the throats of Texans. Of course, the flip side is that if you're a white Republican, life is only going to get better for you.
The reality is that, in the end, this plan will likely stand as is. It will pass legal muster, and eventually Democrats will realize that they are throwing good money after bad in continuing the fight. This is not to say that the DeLay redistricting plan is a good one, however. Of course, the assessment of the plan depends on which side of the political fence you happen to occupy. From where I sit, this plan was little more than a naked power grab on behalf of Tom DeLay and Tom Craddick. The fact that it disenfranchises minorities is viewed by most Republicans as merely a side-effect. Frankly, African-Americans and Hispanics are not the concern of Republicans, since few of them vote Republican.
I understand that Texas is an overwhlemingly Republican state. That reality is an established fact. What concerns me about this plan is that it appears to have been all about giving Tom DeLay the Republican seats from Texas that he demands. The impact on minority Texans has not even been so much as an afterthought to those Republicans powerful enough to have been pushing this plan.
With this plan, Texas is even more definitively divided into "Haves" and "Have-nots". Of course, inclusiveness has never been part of the Republican Party platform. Tom DeLay's redistricting plan simply confirms that reality- like there was any doubt before this travesty.
