The Supreme Court Upholds One Person, One Vote:

An important decision today in the Supreme Court that helps to stultify the efforts to stop the growing political power of our communities..  The Latino and Latina Roundable held a well-attended forum in Pomona a few months ago and brought attention to the significance of this case, Evenwel vs. Abbott, and how we had to be vigilant of its intent at changing how electoral districts are drawn across the country (revamping who comprises electoral districts) and reshaping who is ultimately represented by elected officials.  The challengers in the Texas case, represented by the conservative legal group Project on Fair Representation, argued that the practice of drawing Congressional districts should no longer use total population from census figures as a marker for creating electoral districts – but that it should exclude those ineligible to vote , such as undocumented immigrants, felons, and young people below the voting age.

If the Supreme Court would have decided otherwise, it would have meant that, in areas where there are a large number of noncitizens – those districts would have had diluted representation – because the districts would have been drawn just on the basis of the numbers of voters and not based on the total population.  This is a big victory against the conservative right-wing forces  who are seeking to suppress the growing political power potential of our Latino and Latina communities – our immigrant communities — and the potential of the political strength of the diverse people of color, women, LGBTQ, labor, faith-based, and community-based coalitions – that have manifested themselves more than ever in recent years.

http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-court-voting-districts-20160404-story.html

Jose Zapata Calderon