Would the 2nd district in the Alabama Senate be a VRA violation?

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

This is the main Huntsville-based seat and while it doesn't look gerrymandered it's actually a pretty insidious one.


The city of Huntsville is about 1.25x the size of a district, although this is largely due to its odd shape, if you include Madison which is almost completely surrounded by the city you get a an area that's just under twice the size of a district. Thus the city is split by making the 2nd a good chunk of Huntsville and almost all of Madison, meanwhile the 7th east of it takes most of the Huntsville black neighborhoods and links it to rural areas southeast and north of the city. The border between the 2nd and 7th is in the black area, and the 2nd could easily extend east, or the 7th west and lose the rural area. But because of the split the 2nd is a district that voted for Trump by a hair (0.54%, closest district in Alabama), and the 7th voted for Trump by 9 points. Both are represented by Republicans.

It's hard to not see as an intentional attempt to split and dilute the black vote in an area that has a clear concentrated black population.

[Oryxslayer]

Thomas v. Allen, the legislative lawsuit against Alabama separate from Milligan and on its own track, alleges the Huntsville Area is a racial gerrymander under the 14th Amendment. It notes how the districts changed significantly in redistricting and surgically spit (their words) the city's African American community.

The suit makes racial gerrymandering claims against the State Senate map in other regions as well, but the only Section 2 VRA claim is against SD25 in Montgomery/Black Belt. Perhaps they were concerned about the proportionality defense and deemed SD25 the easiest target.

[Vosem]

Seems pretty similar to the Jacksonville split in Florida, right? And that one's been found to be fine. Under Milligan, seats are only protected if it is possible to draw a compact performing seat where an outright majority of the population belongs to the minority group in question (which is not possible in northern Florida; even if you send tentacles to Tallahassee or Orlando it won't be majority-black). If it is possible to do so in Huntsville then it may indeed be a VRA violation.

[GALeftist]

Seems pretty similar to the Jacksonville split in Florida, right? And that one's been found to be fine.

Point of order – it hasn't yet been found to be fine, that lawsuit hasn't yet been decided. Nevertheless, you are correct that it probably doesn't violate section 2 (the dispute is over the Florida Constitution's retrogression and partisan fairness provisions), so for these purposes it might be analogous provided that a majority black district in Huntsville is impossible to draw.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Seems pretty similar to the Jacksonville split in Florida, right? And that one's been found to be fine.

Point of order – it hasn't yet been found to be fine, that lawsuit hasn't yet been decided. Nevertheless, you are correct that it probably doesn't violate section 2 (the dispute is over the Florida Constitution's retrogression and partisan fairness provisions), so for these purposes it might be analogous provided that a majority black district in Huntsville is impossible to draw.

You can draw a plurality black seat that is safe D. But it only gets to like 46% black or so.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Seems pretty similar to the Jacksonville split in Florida, right? And that one's been found to be fine.

Point of order – it hasn't yet been found to be fine, that lawsuit hasn't yet been decided. Nevertheless, you are correct that it probably doesn't violate section 2 (the dispute is over the Florida Constitution's retrogression and partisan fairness provisions), so for these purposes it might be analogous provided that a majority black district in Huntsville is impossible to draw.

You can draw a plurality black seat that is safe D. But it only gets to like 46% black or so.

Yeah that's what's currently unclear about the VRA. Drawing a 50% black seat here is impossible, but drawing a functional seat is possible. Much legal precedent has used the ability to draw a 50%+ seat as a trigger for VRA, even if the seat ultimately drawn to remediate the problem is less than 50%.

[Mr.Phips]

Seems pretty similar to the Jacksonville split in Florida, right? And that one's been found to be fine. Under Milligan, seats are only protected if it is possible to draw a compact performing seat where an outright majority of the population belongs to the minority group in question (which is not possible in northern Florida; even if you send tentacles to Tallahassee or Orlando it won't be majority-black). If it is possible to do so in Huntsville then it may indeed be a VRA violation.

Under any reasonable interpretation of the Fair Districts Amendment of the Florida state constitution, the current Jacksonville split would not be allowed.  The only reason to split Jacksonville that way is to ensure that a Democrat isn’t elected in that area.  The FDA states that districts cannot be drawn with the intent to favor or disfavor a political party.  That is clearly what was done here.

[TheElectoralBoobyPrize]

Weird seeing a thread about MY state Senate district on Atlas...didn't realize it just barely went for Trump.