by At a town hall on Thursday night, U.S. Representative Marc Veasey, a Democrat from Fort Worth, commended California Governor Gavin Newsom’s proposal to use his own redistricting effort to oppose Texas Republicans’.
As a top objective for President Donald Trump, Texas Republicans are working to redesign the state’s congressional map in order to gain five additional seats in the upcoming midterm elections. The state Legislature was unable to adopt the new maps during a special session this summer because Texas Democratic members fled the state in response.
Veasey’s Congressional District 33, which runs from Fort Worth to Dallas, is one of the congressional districts that Republicans want to alter. It would be limited to Dallas County under the revised maps. The Texas Tribune’s study suggests that Tarrant County would be mostly divided into Republican-leaning districts.
Fans were utilized to combat the August heat as fifty people crowded a meeting room at Fort Worth’s Southside Community Center Thursday night to hear from Veasey. Redistricting in the middle of a decade is something he dislikes, but in this instance, it must take place in California.
I’m happy that Newsom took the call because, as Veasey stated, “that’s the only way you’re going to get them not to do it again in the future.” For them, there must be some loss involved.
It was dubbed mutually assured destruction by Veasey.a phrase used to characterize a nuclear standoff between the US and the USSR during the Cold War. If one nation dropped the bombs, the other would follow suit.
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Republican Governor Greg Abbott has promised to summon another special legislative session, which he ordered last summer to redraw congressional lines. Additionally, he told CBS 11 that Republicans are considering running for eight seats rather than five.
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Veasey and other opponents of the redistricting plan accuse it of being racially discriminatory and an attempt to dilute the voting power of Black and Hispanic voters.
The revised maps would help Hispanic Texans who vote Republican, Lubbock Republican State Representative Carl Tepper told PBS.Additionally, he stated that partisan map-making is permitted.
We can be partisan while drawing on the maps, and that’s what we’re going to do, he said, even though we’re not authorized to draw by race. The courts have made that very clear, and we are doing just that. We will not attempt to deceive you. We will not tell you lies. These maps are political.
Attendees of the gathering voiced strong opposition to the redistricting attempt in Texas. Fort Worth civil engineer Emile Lange said he came to see what he could do to resist.
“I personally don’t like it,” he added, adding that it’s stacking the deck and, at the very least, unjust.
Recently, Tarrant County conducted its own mid-decade redistricting. In order to increase their majority, the Republicans on the commissioners court successfully sought to rewrite their own precinct maps.
Redistricting has been the subject of two lawsuits against the county; one was filed in June, and the other was filed on Thursday. Both of them claim that the new map discriminates based on race. Redistricting opponents claim the county crammed voters of color into a single precinct in order to restrict their political influence to a single court seat.
Republican commissioners have stated time and time again that their objectives were party rather than racist. In the first complaint, the county’s lawyers contend that the plaintiffs lack evidence that the county had racist intent when it redistricted.
Veasey stated that he needs to consider the implications of redistricting for him in the event that it is approved. His district might be relocated to Dallas, however he now resides in East Fort Worth. He said that he was considering running in a different Tarrant County seat or in the same district but in a separate district.
“I have to sit down with my family at some point and determine what’s going to be the best path for me,” he stated.
He gave the audience his word that he has no plans to relocate to Dallas. House members are not required to reside in the districts they serve, therefore he could still run even if District 33 is changed.
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