On Thursday, March 24, the United States Department of Justice filed a federal lawsuit against Galveston County, in Texas on Thursday, alleging that the county's redistricting plan discriminates against black and Latino/Hispanic voters.

Lawyers for the Department of Justice have accused officials in the Republican-dominated Southeast Texas county of deliberately making “drastic changes” to district lines to eliminate the only district in which the county's black and Latino voters have had the same opportunity to elect chosen candidates.

The complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for Southern Texas, alleges that the redistricting plan approved in November for the county’s governing body, known as the Commissioners Court, was “adopted, in part, for a discriminatory purpose.” It says the plan violates the 1965 Voting Rights Act's provisions against discriminatory voting practices or procedures”, according to NBC News.

It is the Biden administration's third action against the state of Texas over voting rights in recent months, as the as the Department of Justice confronts Republican-led efforts across the country to restrict access to the vote. In that regard, the lawsuit asks the court to bar Galveston County from using the redistricting plan, which is being contested, to hold elections. It also asks the county to design and implement a new redistricting plan.

With the dismantling of “Section 5” of the Voting Rights Act in 2013, which required regions – such as Texas and other states – with a history of voter discrimination, to receive prior authorization from the Department of Justice, or a federal judge, for its voting maps, the only remaining provision of the Voting Rights Act to combat discriminatory maps is “Section 2,” as published by CNN. 

“The Commissioners Court, which consists of a county judge, who serves as the presiding officer, and four commissioners elected from single-member districts, also deliberately excluded the only Black commissioner, Democrat Stephen Holmes, from being “meaningfully involved” in drawing the 2021 plan, the lawsuit says. Holmes told NBC News that the damage has already been done to the county's communities of color”.

“This action is the latest demonstration of the Justice Department's commitment to protecting the voting rights of all Americans, particularly during the current redistricting cycle [and] we will continue to use all available tools to challenge voting discrimination in our country”, in a statement reproduced by the CNN publication.

Galveston County has a long history of trying to eliminate electoral opportunities for its black and Latino voters and of adopting discriminatory redistricting plans, the lawsuit says. The Justice Department twice rejected the county's redistricting plans – in 1992 and 2012 – over concerns about violating the Voting Rights Act.

The vast amount of litigation over the redistricting lawsuits is being taken to the Supreme Court, although the results so far demonstrate the uphill battle that the Justice Department and o other litigants may face, as the conservative majority tends to neglect equity concerns.