How a doughnut-shaped district breaks up voters of color near Fort Hood and helps House Republicans

[TexasTowelie]

by James Pollard, Texas Tribune


In the latest example of creative map drawing in Texas’ redistricting sprint, Republican lawmakers have proposed redrawing the boundaries of one Central Texas state House district so that it is completely encircled by another.

“This strange-shaped doughnut denies folks their voting rights,” Gary Bledsoe, president of the Texas NAACP, said of the shape of the districts. In the proposal, District 54 — home to Killeen and Fort Hood — is the doughnut and District 55 is the doughnut hole.

The doughnut district would be in Bell County, a traditionally red area that has trended blue in recent years as the diverse community around one of the nation’s biggest military installations grows. The combined Black and Hispanic population of those older than 18 in Bell County is nearly equal to the white population of the same age group. Dividing the county into House districts that keep Killeen intact could yield a district that Democrats could win over the next 10 years.

Under the current House map, Killeen — whose residents largely voted for Joe Biden over Donald Trump in 2020 — is kept together in District 54, which also includes the sparsely populated and safely Republican Lampasas County to the west. That district, which is currently represented by Republican state Rep. Brad Buckley, went for Trump by only 0.1 percentage points.

Read more: https://www.texastribune.org/2021/10/12/texas-redistricting-doughnut-fort-hood-bell-county/

[LetMyPeopleVote]

1. There will be litigation

The GOP used to try to hide its gerrymanders. Now they are just being obvious about it