Friday, June 17, 2011

DoJ preclears Virginia House and Senate redistricting plans

Despite unabashed gerrymandering, the Department of Justice has precleared the Virginia House and Senate redistricting plans.

Details here.

The preclearance process is specifically designed to prevent suppression of minority voting power, and not to check other state or federal Constitutional violations.  Having passed this hurdle the only realistic change to House or Senate districts would have to come form a lawsuit.  No one appears to have filed a lawsuit since the passage of these plans, and it is unlikely given the passage of time, that someone with the money and desire would have sat on the sidelines this entire time.

I will take a brief moment to compliment the Department of Justice for preclearing both plans instead of  preclearing the Senate plan while denying preclearance to the House plan.

We may go an entire redistricting cycle without a Virginia redistricting lawsuit with a reasonable chance of success.  Then again Congressional redistricting is yet to be concluded . . . 

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