The Week With Monique | They Want to Gerrymander the Midterms!
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What urgent issue is Monique introducing about Texas and the midterms?
Greetings everyone. I'm Monique Presley. Welcome to the week with Monique. This is that time where we take that one thing, maybe two, that out of all the things that could be capturing your attention in the week, we want you to pay close attention to these and not just pay attention to them, but do something about them. This week, I want to highlight and talk to you about my home state, the Lone Star State, Texas. A place that you may not know was once blue and I would argue is still politically blue non-voting. One of the reasons non-voting is apathy, obviously, but a second reason is because of the active active will of those in power to keep others from voting through voter repression, voter suppression, gerrymandering, and frankly, breaking the law.
We're seeing more of that play out recently, and it's all going to come to a head starting next week. So I want you to be informed and prepared to take action. On July 7th, just a few days ago, Harmeet Dhillon, who's the Assistant Attorney General of the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, reminder, this was the division that in prior administrations, including most recently where it was headed by our dear sister, Kristen Clark, this is where they did things to ensure that civil rights laws were enforced and to punish those who did not enforce them. But now, it's led by Hernique Dillon, and he sent a letter to Texas Governor Greg Abbott and to Attorney General of Texas Ken Paxton on July 7th, in which he expressed the DOJ's concern regarding the constitutionality of four Texas congressional districts.
It's Texas 9, Texas 18, Texas 29 and Texas 33. The letter alleges these districts are quote unquote coalition districts. meaning they were drawn by combining two or more racial minority groups to form a majority and that this constitutes unconstitutional racial gerrymandering. Dillon urged the state to redraw these districts to rectify the alleged race based considerations warning that failure to do so could result in legal action by the attorney general. Now, There are many reasons why this is rich, many reasons why this is a farce, but in response to the letter and pressure from the Trump administration, Governor Abbott has included redistricting on the agenda for a special legislative session, which is scheduled to begin on July 21st, 2025.
That's right.
How does Monique define redistricting and why does it matter after the census?
Two days from now. This Monday, that special station special session is scheduled to begin. And this has been added at the urging of the DOJ, which is now just an arm of the president and the white house. The stated purpose of the session is to create a revised congressional redistricting plan that addresses the constitutional concerns raised by the DOJ. Now, As I said, there are many reasons why this is rich, many reasons why this is a farce. And if you don't know what gerrymandering is and understand the difference between gerrymandering and redistricting, I'm going to tell you, and then we'll get back to the reasons why it's rich. Redistricting is not a bad thing. Redistricting is defined as the process of redrawing the boundaries of electoral districts, such as those for the U.S.
House of Representatives, state legislatures, and local governments to account for population shifts and ensure equal representation. It happens after each decennial census.
What is gerrymandering and how does it differ from legitimate redistricting?
to reflect changes in population distribution within a state or jurisdiction. You can understand why that matters, right? You have an increase in population or a decrease in population. You have people who move from one area to the next. You need to divide or organize the area into new political districts, new school districts to ensure that everybody is represented and that the organizational structure, the divisions are appropriate, equal where possible, but balanced so that you don't have a million, two million more people being represented by one congressional district member than the other. That's not the way that it should be happening. So redistricting is what is done in order to fix that.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What urgent issue is Monique introducing about Texas and the midterms?
0:00–3:23
2
How does Monique define redistricting and why does it matter after the census?
3:23–4:34
3
What is gerrymandering and how does it differ from legitimate redistricting?
4:34–5:58
4
Which Texas congressional districts did the DOJ target and why?
5:58–8:49
5
Why is the DOJ letter and Abbott’s special session described as a farce?
8:49–11:32
6
What is the LULAC v. Abbott case and how does it conflict with the DOJ’s claims?
11:32–14:05
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from The Don Lemon Show
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