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Texas GOP moves to "gerrymander" state courts after Democrats sweep key judicial elections
This is an outrageous stunt by the GOP. Texas is divided into 14 appellant districts with Houston/Harris County having two such districts (the First and the Fourteenth courts). Democrats now control the majorities on several appellant court. 2020 was a bad year for down ballot races but we picked up a couple of seats on the First and Fourteenth courts. The GOP is unhappy and wants to gerrymander the courts
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Texas Republicans are pushing legislation that advocates say will "gerrymander" the state's appeals courts after Democrats swept judicial races in districts serving Dallas, Houston and Austin.
The Texas Senate Jurisprudence Committee on Thursday advanced SB 11, a bill introduced by Republican committee chair Joan Huffman to redraw the boundaries of the state's court of appeals districts. The bill and its state House counterpart in their current form propose only minor tweaks to several districts — but voting advocates warn they are "shell" bills that will soon be loaded with much bigger changes based on proposals from a powerful group to "gerrymander" court districts just months after Democratic judges swept appellate races in five of the state's 14 districts.
The bill is expected to be based on proposals by Texans for Lawsuit Reform, a deep-pocketed legal advocacy group that urged lawmakers to merge the state's 14 districts into five to seven mega-districts, which advocates say are designed to dilute the power of urban areas and make it difficult for Democrats to win in the future.
"This is 100% partisan driven," Anthony Gutierrez, executive director of the voter advocacy group Common Cause Texas, said in an interview with Salon. "The political party they don't like is winning too many districts, so they just want to change them so that can no longer happen." Gutierrez testified at Thursday's hearing.
Texas is one of two states where Republicans are seeking to redistrict courts after the 2020 election, and GOP legislators in several other states have advanced legislation seeking to reform their judicial systems for partisan gain. Pennsylvania Republicans are also pushing an amendment that could "gerrymander" the state's courts, Alicia Bannon, who heads the Fair Courts Project at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School, said in an interview with Salon. Though the effort was originally born out of a ruling striking down a partisan Republican gerrymander, in recent months "the court's also been targeted for its role in some of the decisions in connection with the 2020 election ensuring that people had a meaningful opportunity to vote," she said.
The Texas Senate Jurisprudence Committee on Thursday advanced SB 11, a bill introduced by Republican committee chair Joan Huffman to redraw the boundaries of the state's court of appeals districts. The bill and its state House counterpart in their current form propose only minor tweaks to several districts — but voting advocates warn they are "shell" bills that will soon be loaded with much bigger changes based on proposals from a powerful group to "gerrymander" court districts just months after Democratic judges swept appellate races in five of the state's 14 districts.
The bill is expected to be based on proposals by Texans for Lawsuit Reform, a deep-pocketed legal advocacy group that urged lawmakers to merge the state's 14 districts into five to seven mega-districts, which advocates say are designed to dilute the power of urban areas and make it difficult for Democrats to win in the future.
"This is 100% partisan driven," Anthony Gutierrez, executive director of the voter advocacy group Common Cause Texas, said in an interview with Salon. "The political party they don't like is winning too many districts, so they just want to change them so that can no longer happen." Gutierrez testified at Thursday's hearing.
Texas is one of two states where Republicans are seeking to redistrict courts after the 2020 election, and GOP legislators in several other states have advanced legislation seeking to reform their judicial systems for partisan gain. Pennsylvania Republicans are also pushing an amendment that could "gerrymander" the state's courts, Alicia Bannon, who heads the Fair Courts Project at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School, said in an interview with Salon. Though the effort was originally born out of a ruling striking down a partisan Republican gerrymander, in recent months "the court's also been targeted for its role in some of the decisions in connection with the 2020 election ensuring that people had a meaningful opportunity to vote," she said.
This is from the State party
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One of the repugs pushing this is a really nasty state senators who used to be judge. She is a truly nasty piece of work who make Juanita Jean's husband go to trial while their oldest son was dying with cancer. Juanita Jean's husband was a democrat and she saw nothing wrong with forcing him to leave the bedside of their dying child.
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