Speaker 1: This week's episode of the Tribcast is brought to you
by south By Southwest. Hello, and welcome to the Texas
Tribune Tribcast for Tuesday, November twenty fifth. I'm Eleanor Klibanoff,
redistricting report uh law and politics reporter, basically redistricting.
Speaker 2: Reporter for the Texas Tribute.
Speaker 1: Yeah one and the same, joined this week by special
guest host, politics editor Jasper Schaer.
Speaker 3: Jasper, how are you?
Speaker 4: I'm good, Thanks for thanks for having me. I feel
like this is this is the appropriate topic to be discussing.
It has dominated our work lives, so glad, We're glad
we're doing it.
Speaker 1: Like we both need a place to process through what
has happened in the last week.
Speaker 2: Therapy session, Yeah.
Speaker 3: Therapy session.
Speaker 1: Matthew is having probably an actual therapy session, and you
know his is off for the week, well deserved after
very busy trip fest. But for those of you traveling
for the holidays or looking to escape your families for
about forty minutes, we are here for you to bring
you into our weird family of our feuding uncles Jeff
Brown and Jerry Smith. We're gonna talk this week, obviously
about redistricting and just sort of walk through where things stand.
Speaker 3: But it's been a crazy week or so.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, the last as they say, the last week
has been a crazy year. And yeah, I just feel
like everyone involved in the Texas political arena is experiencing
some whiplash with just how you know, especially thinking of
these these candidates who you know, essentially they're for a
lot of them, they're like political futures are going to
be dictated by you know, they're kind of at the
whim of the Supreme Court within the next hopefully next
week or so. I mean, I know the state has
asked for a specific deadline for the High Court to
step in, but I don't know, it's I guess we
have the real deadline is December eighth, that's the filing deadline.
But I think ideally, you know, we'll get some sort
of ruling with a little bit of runway for candidates
to decide what they're what they're going.
Speaker 2: To do here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, hopefully, I mean where it stands now basically is
that the okay, so the to walk us through this.
Last Tuesday, the District Court three judge panel issued their
ruling basically saying Texas's twenty twenty five maps. The maps
they drew over the summer showed a high likelihood that
they engaged the lawmakers engage in racial jerry mandering and
drawing the maps they should not be used for the
twenty twenty six elections while sort of that case proceeds
onward through the legal system.
Speaker 2: Which could take months, years, years.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like we just had the hearing for the twenty
twenty one maps earlier summer. So they were like, while
we sort that out, just go back and use the
twenty twenty one maps that again are still under legal review.
Speaker 4: But right and also still you know, also a partisan jerrymander.
But you know, I think we would be remiss if
we didn't point out that it's still the both of
these maps heavily advantaged Republicans were just talking about totally right,
one that would potentially advantage them even more.
Speaker 1: Right, right, Like Republicans remain the dominant political force in Texas.
The twenty twenty one map was drawn by Republican lawmakers
to support Republican candidates, maybe more to support incumbents than
to take like a very aggressive tack towards building Republican districts,
but a very I mean that's why that it's one
of the reasons that that map was challenging court was
that plaintiffs were unhappy with both what they saw as
racial jerrymandering, but also you know, it was a very
aggressive Republican map.
Speaker 2: Right yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean I think just sort of you know, overarching summary.
I mean, the state has thirty eight congressional districts, and
you know what we're talking about between these two maps
is you know, a current layout where Republicans pretty almost
automatically control twenty five of those thirty eight seats unless
we see a you know, a mega blue wave in November,
and that's you know, compared to this twenty twenty five
map that would you know, secure up to thirty seats
for Republicans. I think, you know, maybe somewhere in the
ballpark of twenty eight to thirty, depending on how I
think those those two South Texas districts are kind of
the most iffy for Republicans, which which we can talk about,
but you know, it's we're kind of talking about a
sliding scale of like a three to five seat difference.
Speaker 1: Which could make a huge difference in the US House.
It's a little bit less I mean to these candidates.
It's relevant in Texas, but this is much more of
a national situation.
Speaker 4: That does happen to be roughly the margin of you know,
the how closely the house is divided right now?
Speaker 2: So there you go.
Speaker 1: So these judges, so the three judge panel redistricting cases
are weird. They go before three judges instead of one.
They issued this ruling from two of the three judges
last Tuesday, saying there's evidence Texas virtually jerrymanderd used the
twenty twenty one maps while we sort this out. Unsurprisingly,
Texas appealed that to the Supreme Court. Again, redistricting is weird.
It goes directly the Supreme Court. We can talk about
what the third judge had to say, but that's sort
of less relevant to the timeline.
Speaker 2: But do you have something to say?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I have a few things to say.
Speaker 1: So Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, who oversees cases from
Texas or emergency orders from Texas, stepped in granted a
temporary administrative stay, sending Texas back to the twenty twenty
five maps on Friday night while they figure out whether
or not they want what map they want Texas to use.
While all of this proceeds, and so we are now
currently in theme. Is possible by the time this you
hear this, it has already been resolved. But in all
likelihood we're still in the waiting game of you know,
what will the Supreme Court say, not even did Texas
racially jerrymander or is the map unconstitutional or did the
DJ let her mean anything. All we're going to find
out is what map should Texas use while the Supreme
Court appeal proceeds, which, considering the as you said, the
short timeline, is likely to have huge impacts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 4: I mean, I guess I'm curious from you from your standpoint,
from your reporting and just kind of looking at the
precedent when situations like this have happened before in other states.
I mean, I guess I am curious, you know, if
the fact that Alito, you know, issued this this short
term decision, you know, if we can read anything kind
of from the tea leaves out of that. And I
guess I'm also you know, wondering if you know, typically
the sp Court has established in the past that it
will you know, lean in the direction of stepping in
and you know, keeping the maps on hold, you know,
for the upcoming election cycle versus h you know, stepping
into to allow them. So I think that has maybe
happened in Louisiana recently.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I don't know that we can read
a ton into Aledo's temporary administrative stay. I mean, obviously
Samuel Ledo a very conservative justice. There's been this like
sort of conservative effort or conservative the conservative justice on
the court have been increasingly opposed to some of the
racial gerrymandering arguments have been brought in front of them recently.
So like it, if there is a tea leaf to read,
it's that, like Samuel Ledo remains a very conservative justice.
To get the broader stay, we'll have to go before
the full court in all likelihood. And like, I think
it's not crazy to say, you know, these conservative justices
are probably not overly like sold on the idea that
these racial jerrymandering claims will hold up in court. They've
basically taken very different approaches on a case to case
basis in other states, which I guess is what you
would want your Supreme Court to do, right Like they
are not. It's not as easy to say, like, you know, ugh,
the six conservative justices. There ain't no way they're gonna
let Texas, you know, use the twenty twenty one maps.
There have been cases certainly where they have you know,
intervened in one direction versus the other. There was an
interesting case in Alabama a couple of years ago where
they did issue a stay and said, like basically they said, like,
Alabama should use the new maps that they drew. We
don't the implicitly saying like, we don't believe that there's
evidence of racial gerrymandering. Two years or a little more
than a year later, they came back with their official
ruling and said, like, no, you were right, there was
racial jerrymandering.
Speaker 3: That map should have been struck down.
Speaker 4: But I guess, you know, in the Texas case, you
could theoretically have the flip side scenario where they you know,
potentially put this map, this new map on hold for
the twenty twenty six elections, but then come back and
rule for you know, I guess the twenty twenty eight
cycle that actually this map is fair game.
Speaker 2: So I guess you know, you could see the convex
of that, right.
Speaker 1: It's like very I mean, and there's no way any
Supreme Court justice is not taking some political calculation on
this not I mean, I you know, all the experts
I've talked I've spoken to are like in many ways,
I Supreme Court justices.
Speaker 3: Are not as politically.
Speaker 1: Or like, are not as politicized as we think or
like as the caricature would make you think.
Speaker 2: Like.
Speaker 1: They are still like thoughtful jurists who will look at
each case on its merits and also like it's the
most usually like when they're dealing with redistricting cases, at
least they have like a lot of states all happening
at once, and this is like just Texas.
Speaker 4: And it's just pure politics, pure partisanship, pure you know.
It's it's probably more so than any other case you
could realistically like draw up that would ever go before them.
So it's it's of course impossible to imagine how you
could look at this through just like a purely uh
you know, judicial textbook lens. So I you know, I
it strikes me that I guess the Court has also
established essentially that you know, when it's sort of a
fifty to fifty situation, when it's kind of up in
the air whether racial jerrymandering has occurred, that you know,
the courts should you know, err on the side of
like giving the the state legislature the benefit of the
doubt and you know, and sign off on the maps.
But I guess in this case what we're talking about
now with the Texas maps, the question before the court
is not, you know, as it stands right now, it's
not on the merits of you know, the maps. It's
just whether kind of almost it's like a logistical consideration
whether they should be paused or not. I don't know,
do you have anything to add to that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think the plaintiffs would say it
is on the merits because we want the Supreme Court
to agree that we are likely to prevail at trial.
Speaker 4: And so I guess a preliminary ruling on the merit
not a full consideration of them.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think the state is really trying to make a
logistical argument. They're citing this like twenty sixteen Supreme Court
case called Percel, where they're basically saying where Supreme Court
basically was like, we shouldn't intervene on election law, election
policy things like this too close to an election.
Speaker 3: It's like putting our thumb on the scale.
Speaker 1: And so they're saying logistically whether or not, I mean,
they're saying we didn't racially Jerrymander. But if even if
we did, the percel principle says, like you cannot intervene
this close to the election. The plaintiffs are saying, it's
your fault, it's this close to the electriction.
Speaker 4: I was going to say, you know, to get it
a little bit into the weeds of some of these
these very colorful or at least one of the very
colorful opinions. Jerry Smith, the judge who dissented in dramatic fashion,
pointed out at one point in his what was it
a one hundred.
Speaker 3: One hundred and four page yes.
Speaker 4: In his descent that you know, the essentially he was
he was alluding to the Democrats who broke korum in
the Texas House left the state for a couple of weeks.
And you know, I guess in Smith's argument, in his eyes,
he's he's saying that pushed the timeline back, and and
you know, it's almost like it's it's the Democrat's fault
that we're in, you know, jeopardy of running a foul
of this purcel principle.
Speaker 2: So I I thought that was interesting.
Speaker 1: That he's putting on the Democrats, I think, also saying
like it took these other two judges a long time
to issue their ruling, so they've pushed us closer. He
also criticizes them for putting it out too soon and
not giving him a chance to dissent. Let's talk about
this dissent because it is honestly, if you're looking for
something to read over the holidays, I have one hundred
and four pages of chaos for you. So, judge, we
should say, like, when the ruling first came down, it
was from Judge Jeff Brown, who is a Trump appointee,
former member of the Texas Supreme Court, clerked for Governor
Greg Abbott, appointed to the Supreme.
Speaker 2: Court by.
Speaker 1: Rick Perry by all accounts, I mean, and he was
appointed by President Trump during the time when President Trump
was like really you know, under with the guidance of
Senator Ted Cruz and John Cornyan like appointing really really
conservative judges to Texas courts. He was like part of
this class of very conservative judges.
Speaker 4: Been very high esteem from all the people who have
appointed him to stuff and just everyone involved in the
conservative ecosystem.
Speaker 1: It seems like, yeah, absolutely up until recently, up until recently.
Speaker 3: But he issued this ruling and he was the author
of it.
Speaker 1: The other judge, David guadarama Is, was appointed by President
Barack Obama. He Jeff Brown on behalf of the two
of them, wrote this ruling that essentially pretty concretely and
overtly accused Texas lawmakers are racially jerrymandering instruck on the map,
and they were really pretty outraged by this. Yeah, certainly
Texas Republicans. And there was no descent attached, which is uncommon.
Usually you get sort of the whole package all at once.
The next day, Smith issued this descent that it was
a very personal attack on Brown, basically saying like he
like going through like emails they sent each other of
like how the timing work, so that he was felt
he was like cut out of the descent or cut
out of like having a chance to put his descent
on the ruling.
Speaker 4: Really kind of a remarkably detailed timeline, sort of peeling
back the curtain on how some of these things work.
Speaker 2: Sound that kind of interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, The descent starts with fasten your seat belts, it's
going to be a bumpy night.
Speaker 2: And it was and it was.
Speaker 1: And then later he does and I didn't notice this immediately,
but he uh later in a footnote says I did
say it was going to be a bumpy knight, didn't I,
and then signs it off with one hundred and four
pages later, Darkness descends on the rule of law a
bumpy knight.
Speaker 3: Indeed.
Speaker 1: Wow, so a degree of drama, I would say, poetry, Yeah, exactly.
I think like the question is like the first I
don't know, twenty five pages are like personal attacks on Brown,
which don't I don't think, really play a huge.
Speaker 3: Role in it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The other part is a main character in the descent
is George Soros certainly not involved in this?
Speaker 3: But who is George Soros? And why is Smith?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I guess, well, so big picture, I mean George Soros
a Democratic megadonner who has gotten involved in just all
sorts of elections, you know, across the state, including in
Texas at this especially I think at the state and
local levels. I mean he's you know, at least where
I first encountered him in my reporting career was in
his contribution to local prosecutors like district attorney races to
try to get progressives in office, but his I guess
Smith and his descent was also drawing ties between Soros
and uh, you know, some of the groups that employ
the lawyers who are on the side of the plaintiffs.
And I believe his sources name was invoked seventeen times
if I'm remembering correctly, So it's and and you know,
accompanying Soros in Smith's descent was California Governor Gavin Newsom,
who Smith noted would be one of the main beneficiaries
of this this decision decision referring to the to to
California's fairly recent move at least recently the voters in
the states signed off on the Newsom led plan to
to respond in kind with Jerry manderd that net five
seats for Democrats in California. So it was it was
kind of a striking, you know, involvement of these political
figures in a in a legal opinion that also, you know,
separately went on to you know, discuss the legal merits
of the case in the situation, but accompanied by quite
a bit of other stuff.
Speaker 1: We can say, yeah, yeah, I mean, Soros is kind
of this like liberal boogeyman or I guess maybe like
conservative boogeyman in a way. Right, He's like saying something
is like sorrows backed is like saying it's you know,
so liberal as to be you know.
Speaker 4: Right, it's it's sort of a it has become like
a code code word for everything that conservatives you know hate,
and everything you know, tied to liberalism that they're morally
opposed to.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, which is interesting. It also is just like
not relevant. He's not a party to this case or
really involved. I will say Smith makes a nice point.
He rips apart the lawyers involved in the plaintiffs as
like basically Soros funded Hills, and then in a footnote
is like, to be clear, I respect them.
Speaker 3: I think they're great. Juriss Let's move on. It's a
wild dissent.
Speaker 1: But you know, and I got a lot of I
got this question frequently in my email and in my
tweet mentions or x mentions, So I think we should
discuss it, which is like a lot of people are
saying like, oh, well, like if the courts allow California's
redistrict to go through but they strike down Texas, is
like only the left gets to redistrict, And it's like
the facts of these redistricing cases are so specific, and
there's certainly already California's face legal challenges.
Speaker 3: And probably will still. But it's like these not the
same thing, right.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's totally different things under consideration. And I guess
we should also point out that the you know, the
passage of California's map is not in any way contingent
upon the Texas map. I know that that was coming
up a lot, and there was maybe an initial pre
vision in the California map legislation that would have would
have made it contingent on the text map. But yeah,
I think you know, they're they're fully separate, but in
that sense and also just in the the set of
facts that the judges will be considering in both cases.
I guess, you know, there are also some some things
that we could probably unpack from Smith's descent if we're
just thinking about, you know, how the Supreme Court might
come down on on Texas's map and some of the
things they might consider. And you know, one thing that
you highlighted in in one of your stories was that
Smith was really pushing back on this. I mean, it's
kind of the crux of browns of Judge Brown's, you know,
his his majority opinion where he was saying that Governor
Abbott's comments in the lead up to redistricting, where he
was talking about this you know, Department of Justice letter
that we've written about, and you know that you've talked
about probably ad nauseum at this point on the podcast,
just you know, specifically singling out this issue of coalition
districts where multiple racial groups can can band together to
form a majority to bring challenges under the Voting Rights Act.
You know, gunn Rabbits invoking of that that letter was
a big part of, you know what why Brown ended
up deciding that, yes, this did amount to racial jerrymandering.
And so Smith comes in and says the fact that
Abbot's comments about he also mentioned Hispanic districts, Hispanic majority
districts right right, He was saying that, I guess he
Abbot's comments about Hispanic districts came after the first version
of the map was drawn, which Smith said shows that
Abbott had quote adjusted his rhetoric to defend the map
in a forward facing capacity, rather than directing the legislature
to redraw based on a race based premise. I wonder
if you could help kind of unpack what's going on there.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that, like this is the really complicated
thing about redistricting, and it is part of why the
Supreme Court has said, like, if you're not sure, give
the legislature the benefit of the doubt, in part because
like this is really really complicated, and like not messing
up is in many ways harder than messing up.
Speaker 3: Now, Like, the role that.
Speaker 1: Race should play in redistricting is very complicated because, on
the one hand, the Voting Rights Act right is like
very clear you cannot dilute the voting power of minorities.
The juris prudence or like the legal analysis around that
that has developed has struggled mightily, I think, to figure
out what is unconstitutional racial gerrymandering? When can you how
can you disentangle race and partisanship?
Speaker 3: How can you? Is it bad to say.
Speaker 1: Oh, we're creating actually more district We're going to make
it easier for black and red people to elect their
candidate of choice.
Speaker 3: How how could that be bad?
Speaker 1: Well, like, the constitutional claims are like, you know, you
really can't take race, You can't unduly take race into account, period.
And the argument that Brown is making is that it
is clear from Abbot's comments and the comments of several
state lawmakers that they were trying to create these majority
Hispanic districts or these majority Black districts to like sell
the map, basically to cover up their partisan and aims.
Speaker 3: And the main thing he points to is.
Speaker 1: From this is that those districts are all like fifty
point one percent Black, fifty point two percent.
Speaker 2: Raise bare majority was bear majority?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 1: And that is to Brown, and certainly to the plaintiffs,
but to Brown evidence that you know, they did not
accidentally create these districts for pure partisan gain. They intentionally
created slight majorities so that they could, as they did,
go to the media and stand on the floor of
the House and say, how could this be bad?
Speaker 3: We have created these districts.
Speaker 2: Right right before we move.
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and conditions to get faster doing that last part, like
I'm in.
Speaker 2: A pharmaceutic lad, it was okay, thank you.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean, I think this question and like
Abbot's role in all of it is an interesting subplot.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean I think he you know,
as this was unfolding, we thought, you know, just kind
of talking in the newsroom that you know, it seemed
like a potential item that could you know, come up
you know in court once this was inevitably challenged, but
it wasn't really clear if you know, the judges would
interpret it that way in the sense that you know,
of course, there was there was clearly some mention of
you know, race and that you know, comments that suggested
lawmakers were taking that under consideration, specifically in some of
the TV interviews that Abbot was that Abbot did that
they were actually cited.
Speaker 2: In Brown's opinion.
Speaker 4: But you know, I think it was it was to
me at least really unclear whether you know, that would
have been all of that would have been outweighed or
kind of overridden by the course correction that lawmakers took
once you know, the maps started flowing through the pipeline.
You know, they were doing committee hearings and talking about
this on the House floor, and there really did seem
to be this this you know, somebody, I don't know,
I feels like somebody got them in the in a
room and sort of shook some sense into them. But
there was clearly like a memo that went out of
you know, of some sort or some sort of direction.
You like, guys like, we got to really emphasize we
are purely you know, this is pure purely for partisan gain.
But you know, you also saw while that's that is true,
there were also even some situations where lawmakers reverted back
to talking about race on the House floor. And I
thought that was really interesting that that Brown brought that
back into his brought that into his opinion talking about
State Rep. Todd Hunter, the kind of head honcho of
the House's redistricting push, who was kind of unprompted going
through all the against your point. You know, it's kind
of a confusing situation where in this case, Hunter was
presenting as a you know, a positive that these districts
were increasing minority representation. But I guess in the eyes
of Brown, it's you know, you're considering it, whether it's
it's being framed as positive or negative, and that was
that ended up being enough to help sway his opinion.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think Hunter, you know, took some ls in
this ruling. I think certainly, like I think just it
is very I think sort of when you look at it, like,
not as a legal matter, but as a like Democrats
were just like railing on Republicans saying, this is part
is in game playing. You're trying to steal an election.
You're trying to steal seats. And it's hard to believe
that if they had just said, like, yeah, we're trying
to steal some seats. We want to cook the twenty
twenty six elections so that we can give President Trump
five more seats and hold the House for sure.
Speaker 4: And you know, it's not say that the Democrats didn't
focus at all on the racial gerrymandering aspect, but it
is sort of ironic that, you know, we're at this
current moment after them the vast majority of the Democrats
messaging was how this was like a power grab, and
you know, it's I wonder if I mean, they did
end up getting the ruling that they wanted, of course
from this panel, but I wonder if the playbook, if
we get our you know, once the twenty thirty mid
decade redistrict angles around, maybe the Democrats will focus more on,
you know, probing the presence of any racial considerations that time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it certainly is one of those like it's hard
and they have been criticized for like coming out before
they even see a map and saying, oh, it's definitely
racially gerrymandered, and it's like, so I understand why they
make the partisan claim. And frankly, I think in some
ways it worked right, like they got I don't know
if this was actually a strategy, but if you look
at where we stand now, by pushing so hard on
the partisan things and the partisan angle of the result
was that Republicans felt forced to sort of say like no, no, no, no, no,
it's not partisan.
Speaker 3: No no, no, we wouldn't do that.
Speaker 4: And it's like, oh right, it was sort of the politically,
you know, the political argument that you know, the in
terms of gaining the advantage in the public arena. You know,
they thought it was the best approach to to say, no,
we're we're doing this to fix this problem flagged by
the DJ. But really the this is just you know,
pure raw politics, and really what matters is what's going
to hold up in court. So they really should have
been from the outset just purely thinking about what was
going to secure a legal victory, as opposed to you know,
it was it's kind of the opposite of this is
a little far afield, but I was just I was
listening to Tony Busby, Houston attorney, on conservative talk radio
in Houston the other day talking about how in the
Ken Paxson's impeachment trial he was really keeping it like
you would keep an eye on Twitter, you know, when
he was whenever he wasn't talking, and he was like
really cognizant of how the public was interpreting the legal
arguments because the jurors were state senators who were you know,
subject to the voters. And so that's kind of the
opposite side of the needle. Like here, it's really just
you got to drive home it's partisan, partisan, partisan, and
nothing else.
Speaker 1: Right, And part of this is that that's pretty new, right,
the Supreme Court in twenty nineteen basically said we don't
believe partisan Jerry mannering is like an issue for the
courts to weigh in on. So a lot of this
is changing quickly and probably changing a lot more. The
other person that I want to talk about who caught
a lot of flak in this ruling. Actually, it's like
the one person all three judges agree on is Senator
Phil King Weatherford Senator, state senator who chaired the state
the Senates redistricting Committee. In Brown's ruling, they basically said,
like they don't Brown and Guateama basically said that they
did not believe he was being truthful in his testimony
on the stand, and Smith essentially said, yeah, no, I
agree with that. But each used that point to make
their own point. But it's like the one thing they
agree on is that center Fiel King. You know, I
don't think they go so far to say he lied
on the stand, but they said he was not credible
or believable.
Speaker 4: Right, And I guess the point there was that what
was at issue with King's comments was, you know, his
relating of his own conversation with Adam Kincaid. I think
it's confirmed he's the map drawer. He's kind of behind
the handle the mouse. Yeah, exactly, And so by you
put this in your story, by King's retelling, he explicitly
told Kinkaid he didn't when they met one on one,
he told King kid he didn't want to talk about
redistricting and never asked about how many seats Republic Mike Gain.
And then Kincaid follows up by saying, King spoke openly
with him about the process and they discussed how many
seats the GOP could get. So but and so what
was Smith? You were saying that he used that situation
to make his own point. How did he use that
to bolster his case for why the map should be upheld?
Speaker 1: So a lot of this comes down to Adam Kincaid,
who is, as Smith notes, like, not a lawmaker and
not you know, the governor, Like he has no real
role in Texas, but Texas essentially hired him. He's like
the GOP's map drawer in chief.
Speaker 4: He's formerly the executive director of the National Republican Redistricting Trust.
Speaker 3: I think he's still the executive director.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, sorry for Molly.
Speaker 1: As Mai yes, yes, yes, so yeah, and he you
know Kinkaid testified in El Paso both during the twenty
twenty one hearing, twenty twenty one trial and this twenty
twenty five hearing, because a lot of this comes down
to all this talk of you know, we looked at
racial data. Racial data didn't play a role in this
is did Kingkaid, as the state's sort of hand on
the mouse, take racial data into account? And Brown says
pretty clearly like yes, because how else did he land
on several fifty point two fifty point one percent districts
you know of a certain racial group. Smith says, like, well,
there's no evidence of that. And part of this comes
down to King, Senator King on the stand, you know,
saying I told him I never want to talk about
racial data. He like a couple of things about like
basically it's King is trying Senator King, it seems like
is trying to was almost trying to like bolster the
case that they didn't look at racial data.
Speaker 3: Kincaid sort of, I think, maybe more strategically.
Speaker 1: It was able to like tell this in a way
that seemed to exonerate him as having never looked at
racial data.
Speaker 3: Brown obviously sort.
Speaker 1: Of didn't buy that but these specific conversations about when
Senator King and Adam Kinkaid spoke has really become probably
not like the most important issue in this ruling, but
like a pretty important question of like did a state
senator lie on the stand or at least sort of
say like he couldn't remember and sort of up the skate.
Speaker 2: Yeah, stand, Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think you know the other interesting thing too, with
all these these districts that just barely cross the fifty
percent threshold with in most cases Hispanic majority districts. There
is also one district in Houston that just crossed the
fifty percent threshold for black residents. But especially with the
Hispanic majority districts, we've reported that you know, some you know,
Democrats who study redistricting and are involved in this arenas
think that within those those fifty point three percent Hispanic districts,
the map drawers kind of surgically made it so that,
you know, as part of that fifty zero point three
percent population, they made sure that you know, a sizable
subset were Hispanic voters who do not reliably turn out
to vote, and that was I'm not sure if that
actually came up in any of the opinions, but I
thought that was kind of an important extraneous point that
you know, it sort of lends it, I guess, makes
it a little casts more doubt on the claim that
the map drawers were completely race blind. You know, you
would have to sort of see that as a basically
just a convenient coincidence.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think that's a big part of this is, like,
you know, Hispanic voters or like registered voters, turn out
I think at the lowest rate of any group, and
so drawing a districts that's fifty point three percent Hispanic
if you know you know that, you know twenty percent
aren't going to turn out, is like you've drawn the actual.
Speaker 2: White making district the makeup of the.
Speaker 1: Electorate, which again can be fine if you're not walking
around touting that you drew so many more Hispanic districts
and like you're welcome, which is sort of the vibe
that came like or a little bit of like stop complaining,
we did this for you.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, Yeah.
Speaker 1: So this is all like very the nuances of this
are very complicated, and I do think, like you know,
despite Judge Smith's sort of rhetoric around this, like this
redistrict is very politicized, but the case law around it
is very complicated and evolving, and so I think, like
the judges have.
Speaker 3: It's not as simple as just saying.
Speaker 1: Like do you I mean, it's the politician's job to say,
do we want five more seats?
Speaker 3: It's the judges jobs to say, like, did you do
it right?
Speaker 1: And one factor sort of hanging over all of this
is the this Louisiana case that the Supreme Court has heard,
they heard earlier this month or I guess last month
now about that Basically, if it goes the way that
Louisiana wants and that a lot of these conservative groups want,
it would essentially gut most of the racial protections in
Section two of the Voting Rights Act. And essentially it's
this conservative priority that's been pushed for a while that says,
like the Voting Rights Act was great at the time.
There should be temporal there should be like time limits
on this. We can't just say forever black and Hispanic
voters get, you know, should be like sort of considered separately. Obviously,
many voting rights groups and certainly the Democratic establishment feels
like that is would be like a huge loss to
and really open the door to particularly red states, to
just like run rough shot over the voting rights of
black and Hispanic.
Speaker 4: And this is sort of the point you were just
making about. You know, at certain point there's a cutoff
where you're no longer considering these racial and ethnic groups
as sort of separate. I mean, that's my understanding is
that's sort of an outgrowth or a continuation of the
what went into the twenty twelve ruling that struck down
that no longer required Texas to be subject to the
pre clearance rules in the sense that you know, I
think it was the Chief Justice who issued the opinion saying,
you know, essentially like I mean, it wasn't you know,
he didn't say it as bluntly as like we've solved
the race problem, but he was like, you know, we
were at a different point than we were in nineteen
sixty five when this act was first approved. Which that
so that feels like kind of a subtext or a
theme of a lot of these of these you know,
considerations for the Supreme Court in setting this evolving precedent.
Speaker 1: Right, Like, I think there's been these like chipping away
of like you know, okay, right, like states that have
a history of racial discrimination no longer need to send
their maps to the Department of Justice to get pre cleared.
You know, we've had this the ruling that said, you know,
you have to sort of assume good intentions.
Speaker 3: We've had like other rulings that.
Speaker 1: Said partisan jerrymandering is like kind of okay if you
can justify it as such. Like and I think people
feel like this Louisiana case is probably sort of the
final nail in that coffin.
Speaker 3: It is interesting to me.
Speaker 1: I obviously got my start in Texas covering like the
abortion stuff, and is so funny to me, how like
similar this is in some ways where with the Dobbs case,
like conservative groups have been like slowly, meticulously like finding
the right case, building the jurisprudence, getting the right judges,
like just like moving so and they were like, we
are finally gonna strike down Roe v. Wade with this
Dobs case. And then Texas just came like skidding in
from left field with SB eight and was like right,
do us first, right, yeah, yeah, and like and it's
weird and you're not gonna feel good about it, and
like it's a little legally complicated, but you're gonna have
to uphold it, and like, I don't think that even
the conservative justices were like thrilled.
Speaker 3: About how any of that went down.
Speaker 1: Some of them probably were, but you know, to speak
for my dear friends the Supreme Court, right, and now
we have the same thing, which is like again, these
conservative groups have been like slowly doing that. They finally
got this Louisiana case. It's finally gonna like be it
had to be heard a second time, like they and
Texas comes skidding in out of left field, being like
we did a weird one too.
Speaker 4: Right, I mean, do you do you think that the
Louisiana case has like much potential to be affected by
what I mean? How would how would the you know,
those two cases potentially influence each other.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think certainly, once we get a ruling
in the Louisiana case, it will come to bear on
the eventual ruling on whether or not these maps and frankly,
the twenty twenty one maps are racially jerymandered. They probably eventually,
assuming that the Supreme Court rules the way people expect,
they will will end up upholding these maps ultimately, but
like they are required to operate under the law as
it exists right now, so you cannot sort of proactively
say like we're pretty sure.
Speaker 3: We're going to uphold that.
Speaker 1: So and I think, I mean I talked to one
legal expert who was saying, like, you know, there is
also a world again just interpreting sort of like human
emotions onto these like larger than life justices where you think,
like we are about to do this, why are you
setting like doing this like weird higher bar like you know,
don't so like there's a world in which all sort of.
Speaker 4: Chess pieces set out on the board and came and
knocked them all up exactly right.
Speaker 1: And it's like, you know, do they sort of make
this a bit sort of hold on to legitimacy of
you know, I mean they did in that Alabama case,
like I said, they did rule I think very surprising
a lot of people.
Speaker 3: That was twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1: I think that like Alabama had engaged in racial gerrymandering.
So again, the Spree Court is not like a one
hundred percent predictable on this issue, even if we sort
of know predictably where they might end up going with
this Louisiana case.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So yeah, Texas continues to be a real thorn
in the side of the methodical slow progress.
Speaker 4: Yeah, kind of the erratic stepchild, I guess of the
Conservative government.
Speaker 3: But you know, I'm sure they love them.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, yeah, I mean they've they've they have
given them a lot of key victories over the years too.
Speaker 1: So we stand here now on Tuesday, we're taking this
at eleven forty four am, waiting for a ruling on
a stay from the Supreme Court. Do you think they
will do it on Thanksgiving just to ruin our day?
Speaker 2: Probably?
Speaker 4: Yeah, or maybe like Friday morning when we're still coming
out of our food comas, you know, whatever the most
inopportune time is. I'm racing for that. Yeah, but I
don't know.
Speaker 2: Maybe they'll maybe surprise me.
Speaker 3: I will say.
Speaker 1: Whatever you think of his ruling, we appreciated Judge Brown
issuing it at a normal time on a normal weekday,
and Judgement as well issued his you know, descent at
a normal time on a normal weekday. So thank you
to our friends and the judiciary for that. Samuel Lito
did not Friday night.
Speaker 4: That's fine. He reversed that that streak, but that's okay.
Speaker 1: Yes, As a journalist, my main feelings about most people
is when they issued their p so we're going to
leave it there, and I'm sure this is not our
last regitioning episode, so we will be back after the
holidays with whatever Texas.
Speaker 3: Has done between now and then.
Speaker 1: This week's episode is sponsored by south By Southwest. Our
producers are Rob and Chris.
Speaker 3: You can get all of our episodes wherever you get
your podcasts or on YouTube, and we will see you
next week.