{"id":3220,"date":"2022-03-20T02:13:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-20T02:13:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=3220"},"modified":"2022-08-16T14:17:40","modified_gmt":"2022-08-16T14:17:40","slug":"north-carolina-redistricting-advocates-take-a-victory-lap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/?p=3220","title":{"rendered":"North Carolina Redistricting Advocates Take a Victory Lap"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Ethnic Media Services<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Citizen advocates in North Carolina pushed back against unfair election maps and successfully sued to have them redrawn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the initial rounds of map-drawing the state legislature carved up communities to disenfranchise Blacks and other minorities who make up 39% of North Carolina\u2019s population. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn North Carolina, of the state\u2019s 170 lawmakers, 34 are Black.  Lawmakers\u2019 original maps would have eliminated one fourth of the legislature\u2019s Black political power,\u201d said Kyle Brazile, director of Civic Engagement with the NC Counts Coalition<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The state\u2019s supreme court declared unconstitutional the\u00a0original maps<\/a>\u00a0approved by a mostly Republican legislature. The court found the maps didn\u2019t follow the adopted criteria and systematically divided voters in an extreme pro-Republican gerrymander.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gerrymandering is the game political parties play every ten years after a new census in order to preserve their power and protect incumbent politicians by drawing partisan election maps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Common Cause NC, one of the biggest issues with the maps was unnecessarily splitting the state\u2019s three largest counties three different ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was the cracking and packing of democratic voters in these counties that had ripple effects throughout the maps and the courts threw them out,\u201d said<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tyler Daye, an organizer with Common Cause NC. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Daye noted the original senate and house maps had a pro-Republican bias of 6.6% and 6.1%. New maps lessened the partisan bias to 4.8% and 2.9% respectively. North Carolina\u2019s congressional maps showed a bias of 14.7%. After those lines were redrawn, the Republican bias dropped to .9%. The percentages of voting age African Americans rose significantly in some districts after the maps were drawn more fairly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Earlier this month the U.S. Supreme Court denied a request<\/a> by North Carolina lawmakers to invalidate the maps drawn by court-appointed experts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAll statewide maps, the North Carolina house, senate and congressional maps have now been reformed and have been stricken from their original gerrymander and are set for this year\u2019s elections,\u201d Brazile said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of March 11, 2022, a total of 58 lawsuits have been filed chal\u00adlen\u00adging congres\u00adsional and legis\u00adlat\u00adive maps in 21 states as racially discrim\u00adin\u00adat\u00adory and\/or partisan gerry\u00admanders, according to the Brennan Center for Justice<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Litig\u00ada\u00adtion has resul\u00adted in orders from state courts to redraw legis\u00adlat\u00adive and\/or congres\u00adsional maps in Alaska, North Caro\u00adlina, and Ohio in time for the 2022 midterms. A federal court also ordered a redraw<\/a> of Alabama\u2019s congres\u00adsional map, but the Supreme Court stayed that order pending appeal. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The courts are a big player in these disputes and Republicans filled slots in many state and federal courts during the Trump years. In much of the Midwest and South, state legislatures are red. Activists in North Carolina are creating change by grassroots organizing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cParties aren\u2019t necessarily the folks you have to rely on. Communities are what have your back and that\u2019s who you rely on at the end of the day,\u201d Brazile said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alabama has a robust network of activists. Georgia does, too. So does Texas, though Tennessee does not. Neither does South Carolina. But North Carolina has hundreds of people from at least a dozen well-organized groups that do civic engagement work around a variety of issues, whether it\u2019s a woman\u2019s right to choose, or gerrymandering, or voters\u2019 rights, or expanding Medicaid, criminal justice reform, or environmental justice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More than a dozen advocates spoke briefly on a Zoom call to celebrate getting better election maps drawn in North Carolina. They told each other what they did and what they are going to do next. There were more than 100 people on the call that had simultaneous English and Spanish audio channels. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Each speaker talked about how crucial fair elections are to their mission and they connected the dots for people to understand exactly what stake they had in the fight for fair maps. Some work in cities like Raleigh; others organize in small rural counties like Lee County in the center of the state.  Some are teachers, some are students, some are lawyers, some own their own business, some work for non-profits, and some are community organizers. They are all citizen activists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dylan Dodson and Apri\u2019ela Warren with A Better Chance A Better Community<\/a> have been organizing young people in Halifax County to get vaccinated and adopt a healthy lifestyle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dodson introduced a two-year Redistricting Action Plan that includes town hall meetings, training, and finding partners \u201cto activate youth power and advocate for real solutions.\u201d The group is developing a civic engagement toolkit for young organizers and Dodson said that he wants to increase the number of young social justice leaders 35% by 2023.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur youth statewide citizen engagement summit will highlight redistricting, voter rights, and power building,\u201d Warren said.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

She said they are planning to host a MapOurFuture rally in Raleigh, the state capital. \u201cSo we can strategically plan how to reach youth, specifically,\u201d Warren said.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Source: Ethnic Media Services<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Ethnic Media Services Citizen advocates in North Carolina pushed back against unfair election maps and successfully sued<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3221,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[66,85],"class_list":["post-3220","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-regular-column","tag-african-american","tag-voting-restrictions"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3220"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3220\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3222,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3220\/revisions\/3222"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/africanamericanvoice.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}