Holder Sues Three States For Racist Gerrymandering

Courthouse News reports:

Citing the states’ long histories of suppressing the right to vote among their black voters, an organization headed by former Attorney General Eric Holder sued three states in the Deep South, accusing them of using gerrymandering to dilute the strength of their black voters.

In Georgia, Alabama and Louisiana, local lawyers filed lawsuits in federal court against each states’ Secretary of States Wednesday alleging the Republican efforts in 2011 to redraw congressional lines left many of the minority black voters packed into one district and breaking up pockets of others.

The suits ask the courts to order the congressional districts redrawn and for injunctive relief preventing the use of the 2011 congressional district maps in future elections. On Twitter yesterday, Holder, chair of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, wrote the 2011 redistricting “is a clear violation of the Voting Rights Act – we won’t stand for it.”