Plan H283 – Texas House of Representative Districts. Courtesy of The Texas Legislative Council.
Since entering the presidential race in August, Gov. Rick Perry has been sharply criticized by many of his Republican opponents for being soft on immigration. These attacks have focused on Perry’s support for in-state tuition rates at Texas colleges and universities for undocumented immigrants, opposition to efforts to pass legislation similar to Arizona’s draconian immigration reform (SB-1070) in Texas (the law “may be right for Arizona, but it ain’t exactly right for Texas”), and disagreement with proposals to construct a fence/barrier along the entire U.S.-Mexico border.
In the midst of these continued attacks, Perry may have received some partial assistance from an unlikely source this week: President Barack Obama’s Department of Justice (DOJ). The DOJ refused to grant pre-clearance to the redistricting plans for the state’s U.S. House of Representatives delegation and for the Texas House of Representatives. The DOJ argued that both plans dilute minority voting strength and therefore do not comply with Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. This decision, combined with the recent poor performance of the state of Texas in a redistricting case being argued in federal court in San Antonio, has set the stage for a protracted legal battle in the federal courts this fall.
On one side of this battle will be the Obama administration, Texas Democrats and Hispanic activists. They will argue that the redistricting plans approved by the Texas legislature and signed into law by Perry earlier this year dilute minority voting power and representation. Among other things they will call for a remedy that would have the net result of decreasing the number of U.S. House and Texas House districts that are likely to elect Republicans in 2012 and beyond, and of increasing the number of districts likely to elect Democrats (Hispanic Democrats in particular) in 2012 and beyond.
As a result, Perry could find himself subjected to national media critiques that he supported efforts to maximize the number of Republican seats in the Texas House and Texas U.S. congressional delegation at the expense of expanded representation for Democrats and Hispanics (liberal Hispanics in particular, it would appear, based on DOJ and Democratic opinions related to the 23rd U.S. Congressional District and its current representative, Republican Francisco “Quico” Canseco). Such a situation could also place the governor in direct conflict with the Obama-run federal government. In this conflict, it would not be surprising if Perry and his supporters made an attempt to portray the Obama administration as using what they consider to be outdated legislation (the Voting Rights Act) from a different era (the 1960s) to force a state (Texas) to change the electoral districts created by its democratically elected legislature and governor in order to reduce the representation of Republicans and Anglos and increase the representation of Democrats and Hispanics.
Given what we know about the position of many Republican primary voters on the topics of affirmative action, the Voting Rights Act, the role of the federal government vis-à-vis the states, and the Obama administration more generally, Perry may very well end up benefiting electorally in the Republican primary from the upcoming redistricting battle in the federal courts. For many Republican primary voters the issues of immigration, minority representation, voting rights, and the role of Obama administration in these areas are sufficiently interwoven that a hard-line position on constraining the expansion of Hispanic legislative representation will be interpreted by many as one piece of evidence of a more hawkish position on immigration and on some of the societal, cultural, and political manifestations of a more diverse society.
How any of this would affect Perry’s performance in November 2012 (assuming he is the Republican standard bearer) remains to be seen. Although, in the end in a close election, the Hispanic vote is likely to only be decisive in three states in next year’s presidential contest: Colorado (9 Electoral College seats), Nevada (6 Electoral College seats), and the ultimate Electoral College prize, Florida (29 Electoral College seats). While moves by Perry which alienate some Hispanic voters, would likely have a negative impact on his electoral fortunes in these states, in Florida at least there is a readily available electoral remedy to any ill-will within the Hispanic community he creates during the primary season: selecting Sen. Marco Rubio as his vice-presidential candidate.
Mark P. Jones is the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy’s Fellow in Political Science as well as the Joseph D. Jamail Chair in Latin American Studies and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Rice University.