Setting up the potential for another major Trump Administration victory, Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon announced on Tuesday, August 5, that the Department of Justice will be cracking down on “race-based gerrymandering” of the sort that many blue states have used to artifically boost the number of Democratic congressional seats.
According to Assistant AG Dhillon in the Tuesday video, which was released on the 60th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, that sort of “race-based gerrymandering” is illegal because it promotes racial vote dilution in violation of the Voting Rights Act, and thus will be cracked down on by the DOJ now that the Trump Administration is in charge.
Beginning, Dhillon explained how this move fits in the context of larger efforts conducted by the DOJ as it tries to ensure that Americans are free and fair. She said, beginning the video, “Our constitutional duty is to protect the right to vote for all Americans. 60 years ago, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to confront the brutal reality that too many Americans were being denied their rightful access to the ballot.”
Continuing, she commented on the history of the Voting Rights Act, setting up this move against gerrymandered districts as necessary to protect the civil rights of Americans, saying, “The Voting Rights Act came at a critical time in our nation’s history, and was the catalyst of necessary change. This landmark law removed barriers to voting. It outlawed poll taxes and literacy tests and gave the federal government the tools to stop discriminatory barriers at the ballot box.”
Then, connecting that history to the DOJ’s current actions and investigations against the districts that have been gerrymandered for racial reasons, she said, “Today, under the leadership of President Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi, this civil rights division is continuing to protect equal and transparent ballot access with vigilance and resolve.”
And, describing the various actions being taken to protect the vote, generally, she said, “We are investigating violations of federal voting laws. We’re ensuring that all 50 states have and continue to have clean voter rolls. We are challenging efforts to suppress or dilute the vote. We are attacking illegal race based gerrymandering, and we are protecting ballot access for all Americans.”
Then, describing specific actions taken, she noted that both Texas and North Carolina have been warned that current districts are gerrymandered in a race-based way, saying, “We have sued jurisdictions such as North Carolina for not registering voters properly by first verifying their eligibility. We have notified Texas of grave concerns about congressional districts drawn with racial motivations, and we are suing other jurisdictions where there is evidence of ineligible voters on their voter rolls. Our job is to make it easier to vote and harder to cheat. On this anniversary, we honor the Voting Rights Act, not just by remembering it, but by enforcing it for all Americans, and that’s my promise to you.”
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It was the fixing of that race-based gerrymandering problem that led to the current Texas spat with Democrats over redistricting, as many of the districts that will be wiped away as Texas takes steps to comply with the DOJ’s orders are minority-majority Democratic districts, such as the one represented by Jasmine Crockett.
Watch Dhillon here:
Commenting on the Texas issue in an interview, Dhillon said, “We took a look at Texas, and we found that four of their districts in Texas are comprised of these so-called coalition districts.” Dhillon further added, “In other words, to get to a special minority district, you have to add together multiple minorities or count on a certain percentage of a crossover white vote. And this is too complex, too weird and too inconsistent with equal protection.”
As there are reportedly 25 House seats that are Democratic, allegedly because of the racial gerrymandering that the Department of Justice and Supreme Court of the United States are currently fighting against, an upcoming SCOTUS decision and Dhillon’s resolute actions could mean those over two dozen seats flip red in upcoming elections.