After passing one of the most restrictive anti-voter laws in the country and an extremist, anti-reproductive freedom law that will have disastrous consequences for women across Texas and potentially America, Republicans in the Texas state legislature are now gearing up to gerrymander the state, marginalizing hundreds of thousands of voters across the state.
Governor Greg Abbott announced yesterday that Texas will begin another special session on September 20, 2021 to redraw state congressional and legislative district lines. Republicans in the state have already indicated that they plan to gerrymander the maps, admitting that their partisan gerrymandering is designed to help give them control of the U.S. House of Representatives, even if the party receives a minority of support from voters. During the special session, Republicans also plan to consider discriminatory laws against transgender Americans and dangerous, consipracy-fueled laws against vaccines and are pushing for an sham review of the free and fair 2020 election to further undermine trust in our democracy.
“Republicans in Texas and their dark money allies have been on a mission to pass their extremist agenda by silencing the voices and restricting the votes of the people of Texas. With the special session on redistricting starting later this month, Texas Republicans must not be allowed to gerrymander themselves into power. This extreme gerrymandering creates a lack of accountability to the people and leads to out-of-touch laws like SB1 and SB8,” said End Citizens United // Let America Vote President Tiffany Muller. “The U.S. Senate must pass the For the People Act, which would eliminate partisan gerrymandering and ensure that people choose their representatives, not the other way around. The stakes of protecting the voice and vote of every Texan and every American are too high and the Senate must not allow procedure to stand in the way of passing this bill.”
Governor Abbott’s plan to redraw political districts during a special session already sparked several lawsuits including a lawsuit filed by state Senators Sarah Eckhardt of Austin and Roland Gutierrez of San Antonio arguing that the Texas Constitution requires any political redistricting maps to be drawn during a regular legislative session, which won’t happen until 2023. Texas Republicans want to use the special session for redistricting to influence the 2022 midterm elections.
U.S. Census data released in August showed that Texas is the country’s third-fastest growing state with huge population growth among young people of color in some of Texas’ most populous cities.
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