The National Association for the Progress of Persons of Color (NAACP) filed a federal demand to block the new recently approved in Texas and has unleashed a national battle between Republicans and Democrats on Tuesday afternoon. This organization, the largest and most influential in the United States in terms of rights for African Americans, alleges that the Texan redesign dilutes the vote of minorities, mainly of black people, whom “strips of their political power.”
The lawsuit, presented in the District Court of El Paso, demands a court order that prevents the medium mandate elections of next year, since the plaintiffs consider that it violates both the Constitution and the Law of the Right to Vote. The implementation of the new districts, an express request by President Trump, is expected to result in up to five additional seats for the Republican Party in the House of Representatives. Republicans have defended the plan as a “legal” optimization of the electoral performance of their party.
The NAACP argues, on the other hand, that it is not – only – a matter of partisan advantage, but one that minimizes the electoral capacity of the black communities, and also Latinas, to choose its favorite candidates. “The state of Texas is only 40% white, but white voters control more than 73% of the seats in Congress,” said Naacp’s president and executive director, Derrick Johnson. And he added that “Texas’s attempt to redistribute districts in the mid -decade, before next year’s intermediate elections, has racial motivations. The intention of the State is to reduce the number of congressmen representing black communities, and that, in itself, is unconstitutional.”
For his part, Damon T. Hewitt, president and executive director of the Civil Rights Lawyers Committee ensures that the racial manipulation of electoral districts is not a new tactic in Texas. “The only difference this time is that racism partially disguises itself as partisanship … The Trump administration ordered Texas, without ambiguity, to create illegal and discriminatory maps. Texas fulfilled the order.” “This is an intentionally harmful and discriminatory effort and we must report it as such,” emphasizes Hewitt.
The NAACP also called Ay New York to “act immediately through the redistribution of districts and the approval of new electoral, legal and constitutional maps.” “We must counteract the unconstitutional measure of Texas and ensure that, if everything else fails, African Americans continue to have a voice in Congress,” reads their statement.
For now, California has already approved that the population vote on new maps in November to try to counteract republican gains in Texas, and several other Democratic states are exploring it. However, they are republican states such as Utah, Ohio or Florida, which seem to have more chances of being successful in their efforts to influence the electoral maps in the face of the 2026 elections, when the entire representatives camera is renewed.
Other organizations have also spoken against new maps in Texas. A few days after approval, the United Latin American Citizens League (LULAC) filed its own demand in a federal court in the name of 13 people residing in the State. The National Foundation for Electoral Redistribution also expressed its support for a group of plaintiffs who requested a preliminary order to block the implementation of the new map, since they consider, the, that is, the manipulation of the electoral limits to favor a specific political party.
On the other hand, the local section of the American Union for Civil Liberties (ACLU) denounced that the lower house gave the initial approval to the new maps “without the opportunity for public participation”, while criticizing that “closed doors” in a redistribution that “decreases the power of black, Latin and Asian-American” voters. Its executive director, Oni Blair, said that this matter.
