The Third District of Florida\u2019s Jefferson County has an interesting population. Out of the entire voting age population, 43.2 percent cannot legally vote in County Commission and School Board elections, according<\/a>\u00a0to The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).<\/p>\n The district map for Jefferson County\u2019s Third District was drawn to include the Jefferson Correctional Institute with its 1,157 inmates, who make up more than a third of the district\u2019s population, the Palm Beach Post reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n Gerrymandering, the practice of redrawing legislative district lines to gain political advantages, has become an issue of contention in both Florida and Virginia. For Florida\u2019s Jefferson County, including the inmate population in the Third District resulted in giving eligible voters almost twice the voting power.<\/p>\n Because of the additional 1,157 non-voting inmates included in the Third District\u2019s population, the amount of power that other districts \u2013 and local populations \u2013 have in local politics is diluted. The ACLU\u2019s attorney, Nancy Abudu, told<\/a>\u00a0ThinkProgress, \u201cIt\u2019s about access and the ability to influence, and making sure officials are responsive to their electorate.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n However, a federal judge in Florida\u2019s Northern District has ruled that prison-based gerrymandering is a violation of the \u201cone person, one vote<\/em>\u201d principle under the Equal Protection Clause of Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution. The County has until April 4 to redraw congressional district lines before the June qualifying election for commissioners and school board members. If it fails to do so, the court will impose its own interim plan.<\/p>\n Although this is the first federal ruling on gerrymandering, it won\u2019t be the last. Virginia Republicans are taking their case to the Supreme Court this week to refute accusations of racial gerrymandering.<\/p>\n According<\/a>\u00a0to the US Census, African-Americans made up 19.7 percent of Virginia\u2019s population in 2014. Yet, there is just a single African-American congressman from the Commonwealth out of 11 representatives \u2013 Representative Robert C. Scott (D). The Supreme Court will consider whether Virginia\u2019s Republican lawmakers packed African-American voters into Scott\u2019s district to protect him in order to comply with the Voting Rights Act or, rather, to keep the surrounding districts more friendly towards whites, the Washington Post reports.<\/p>\n Read more<\/p>\n \u201cIn Virginia, state legislators redraw district lines for the US Congress, the Virginia House of Delegates and the Senate of Virginia after every 10-year census,<\/em>\u201d explains<\/a>\u00a0OneVirginia2021, a group dedicated to fair redistricting. \u201cUnder the current system, the party in power in the House and the party in power in the Senate can draw the lines to serve their own interests, not those of our communities.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n Many Virginians agree. The Washington Post found<\/a>\u00a0that, in 2013, 74 percent of state residents thought an independent board \u2013 not the state legislature \u2013 should be responsible for drawing the various legislative and congressional districts.<\/p>\n The state\u2019s Republicans have a different opinion, however, instead, comparing the determination of congressional district lines to Goldilocks figuring out which porridge to eat, as former Virginia delegate Bill Janis (R-Glen Allen), who devised the commonwealth\u2019s congressional map, explained<\/a>\u00a0to the Washington Post.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can\u2019t let the porridge be too hot, you can\u2019t let the porridge be too cold,<\/em>\u201d Janis said. \u201cBut they won\u2019t tell us what temperature the porridge has to be.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n The Supreme Court\u2019s decision could mean big changes for the Commonwealth of Virginia. With over 75 percent of the redistricting plans being challenged in court, high stakes are at play.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Via RT<\/a>. This piece was reprinted by RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A federal judge ruled on Monday that Florida\u2019s practice of using prison populations to manipulate voting districts is unconstitutional, perhaps foreshadowing Virginia\u2019s Supreme Court case questioning the constitutionality of its congressional districts.
The Third District of Florida\u2019s Jefferson County has an interesting population. Out of the entire voting age population, 43.2 percent cannot legally vote […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":233141,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-233140","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233140"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233140\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233141"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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