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Our Future Is On The Ballot

One thing is certain about the redistricting battle now unfolding in Texas: the Texas GOP’s midterm effort to further eke out unfair advantage from the state’s already unfair congressional map is not politics-as-usual; nor is their mission, as Trump insists, a “simple redrawing.”

Just to recap, Trump’s DOJ sent a letter to Texas Governor Greg Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton in July, accusing Texas of maintaining illegal, race-based congressional districts. The DOJ was not concerned about how Texas’ current congressional map weakens the voting power of the state’s burgeoning Black and Latino populations. The letter did not come to the defense of the 800,000 mostly Black, mostly Democratic Houstonians who have been deprived of a political voice for over a year now as Abbott stalls the election to fill their vacant Congressional seat. Indeed, contrary to all empirical reality, the DOJ seemed to contend that Black and Latino Texans actually have too much power.

Under threat of legal action and at Trump’s explicit urging, Texas Republicans called a special session to take another stab at redrawing their congressional map–in breach of the normal redistricting process. Their open agenda: to carve out five additional seats for their party in the U.S. House of Representatives, which they conceded was “an essential step to preserve GOP control in Congress.” But as Rep. Jasmine Crockett noted, their unspoken agenda was also to “mute” and “dilute minority voices.”

In response to this power grab, Texas Democrats left the state to break quorum and prevent the Republicans from moving forward on the new maps. And then all hell broke loose. The Republicans unleashed a volley of threats to oust them from office and bury them in criminal and civil liability for daring to resist, even though many of their tactics stand on obviously shaky legal ground.    

We have already warned that this Administration and their allies are exploiting criminal investigations to undermine elections across the country. Texas is very much part of that larger pattern. But what is unfolding in Texas is that and so much more.

If anything, this Texas saga affirms the central conceit of our newsletter series. Yes, Trump is now waging war on representative democracy–but his assaults simultaneously build on red states’ decades-long project to undermine voting rights while also now sending that project into overdrive. In today’s newsletter, we walk you through the Republicans’ varying tactics to ram through their gerrymander and what those efforts mean for the entire country. The short of it is that a sliced up map of Texas reflects the ridiculous desperation of a party worried about its political future, but it also augurs danger. Danger not only for future elections but, in the words of Jamelle Bouie, the national aspiration of building a “pluralistic, multiracial society of political and social equals.”  

“Maximum Warfare, Everywhere, All the Time”: Criminalizing Dissent

Texas Republicans are weaponizing courts and cops to intimidate Democrats from resisting redistricting in a variety of ways:

  • Civil Penalties. Under Texas House rules, each lawmaker could be fined $500 per day for missing work. When the dust clears, that could leave the Democrats with a $3.2 million bill should they hold out through this year’s potential legislative sessions. Worse, the GOP is threatening representatives’ ability to pay these steep fines with criminal prosecution.
  • Office Removals. As part of an age-old strategy of evading the democratic process to quash political opposition, Paxton has threatened to remove House Democrats from office if they do not return to Texas on Friday to pass the GOP’s new gerrymander. He argues that their quorum-breaking constitutes “abandonment.” Legal experts doubt, however, that Paxton would ultimately be able to prove–as he must–that the members breached their duty and intended to relinquish their seats.
    • On Tuesday, Abbott filed a lawsuit to remove the House Democratic Caucus Chair, Rep. Gene Wu, claiming that he is the “ringleader” of the quorum breaking. Abbott based his filing on Paxton’s dubious theory of abandonment, but even Paxton believes that Abbott lacks authority to request the removal (Abbott disagrees). Nonetheless, this lawsuit will be heard by the Texas Supreme Court–all nine of whom are Republicans and six of whom were appointed by Abbott. If Abbott wanted instead to simply expel members, he would need a quorum, which he currently does not have.
  • Civil Warrants. On Monday, the Texas House voted to issue civil warrants against the Democrats, which could lead to members being tracked down by the House sergeant-at-arms and state troopers and then arrested.
    • The majority of House Democrats left Texas, but the few Democrats who remained behind are now vulnerable to those warrants, which only apply within the state. In fact, Abbott took to the airwaves on Wednesday night to announce that Texas officers are on the streets right now “looking for those Democrat House members to arrest them and take them to the Texas Capitol and hold them there until a quorum is reached.”  
  • Threats of Criminal Charges. Abbott has threatened felony bribery charges for members who fundraise to pay for their fines and those who donate to their cause. Although legal experts say that getting those charges to actually stick will be difficult because it would require prosecutors to aggressively stretch the law to define those political donations as a quid pro quo, that hasn’t stopped Paxton from launching criminal investigations into Texas Majority PAC (TMP) and Beto O’Rourke’s Powered for People, two groups that are helping to support Texas Democrats as they resist. Weaponizing the criminal process to quash dissent is of course a signature Paxton tactic.  
  • Calls for Federal Intervention. The FBI is apparently heeding Sen. John Cornyn and Trump’s calls to find Texas Democrats who have crossed state lines, despite the fact that the agency lacks jurisdiction, as the members are not alleged to have broken federal law. On Friday, Paxton escalated matters by also asking an Illinois court to enforce arrest warrants against the Democratic lawmakers who have traveled to the state.  
  • Climate for Violence. Although Texas Republicans have not outright called for violence yet, their adversarial—and sometimes racist—rhetoric about rounding up members from across the aisle has reached a fever pitch. The potential danger of this moment is underscored by rising political violence that has already been directed at Texas Democrats.

Beyond Texas: The Nationwide Battle for Electoral Control

  • Texas is one of many states trying to aggressively shut voters of color out of the political process. Republicans in Alabama and North Carolina are currently fighting allegations of racial gerrymandering in court, but they are likely heartened by recent developments. Just last month, Florida courts cited “reverse racism” to sanction a redistricting plan that guts a majority-Black district, and the Supreme Court has embraced that same logic to signal a death knell to the Voting Rights Act itself. If states are less fearful about Supreme Court intervention, battles over impromptu redistricting like that in Texas become an important and often last frontier against electoral racism.
    • While racial discrimination is itself odious, we have already seen how this administration uses racism as a pretext to diminish all of our rights; constituents matter less and less if politicians can gerrymander away their concerns and ultimately their power.
  • A Blueprint for Cheating. For Republicans fearful of losing the House next November, these redistricting efforts are existential. Florida, Missouri, Indiana, New Hampshire, and Ohio are already lining up to replicate Texas’ election-rigging scheme and are angling to pick up as many as twelve additional seats in the House. Those efforts have varying chances of success depending on the state, but no matter what, countering them requires time, resources and political capital.
  • “If the Republicans are going to cheat, Texas Democrats are not going to play.” Democrats have vowed to protect voters–particularly vulnerable voters–by fighting back against these electoral assaults. California and New York are already threatening to redraw their maps should the Republicans move forward with what they describe as their “maximum warfare” tactics.

Fighting Back    

  • Resistance from the People. Texas House Democrats are not alone in their fight for democracy. Dozens of ordinary Texans have flocked to the state capitol to testify and protest against the  power grab.
  • Partners and Allies. Support has poured in nationwide. Not only are Powered by People and Texas Majority PAC braving threats of criminal prosecution to help cover costs for the House Democrats’ efforts, governors like Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker have stepped up as allies to spotlight their cause and provide logistical support.  
  • Undeterred and Undistracted. If the Texas powerful believed that their redistricting efforts would divert attention away from the state’s failed response to July’s deadly flood, those hopes were dashed in a 9-hour hearing during the state’s special session. Texas residents and leaders held the line, despite Sen. Charles Perry’s insistence that they “not armchair quarterback or attempt to assign blame.”
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