Today’s Links:
League of Women Voters Kansas
Kansas Reflector article on the May 16 Kansas Supreme Court case
Listen: https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/americandemocracyminute/episodes/2022-05-16T08_14_18-07_00
You’re listening to the American Democracy Minute, keeping your government by and for the people.
Today we’re in Kansas, where redistricting map proposals are being reviewed by the Kansas Supreme Court on May 16. The League of Women Voters Kansas challenged the legislature-approved voting maps, pointing out how the new lines for state House & Senate fractured black and brown communities to intentionally weaken minority voting strength in Wichita, Olathe, Leavenworth and Kansas City, Kansas.
The Kansas attorney general – also a candidate for governor – is endorsing the maps, using a familiar defense of the, “Yes, but it’s all legal.” The Kansas Reflector reports that Attorney General Derek Schmidt is quoted as saying “Anyone who believes a redistricting map is unfair or dissatisfying in some respect can claim gerrymandering, but there is no legal standard to measure such claims.”
This is thanks to the U.S. Supreme Court striking down key portions of the 1965 Voting Rights Act and refusing to hear a gerrymandering case in 2019, kicking redistricting cases back to the states. However, one remaining provision of the Voting Rights Act in place is the intentional gerrymandering of majority minority communities.
The state’s Congressional map is also under scrutiny by the state supreme court after it was struck down by a lower court as unconstitutional. The proposed map waters down the vote of more liberal areas by shifting half of Wyandotte County out of the urban 3rd District, and moves college town Lawrence out of the 2nd District and into the rural 1st District.
We have links to the League of Women Voters Kansas website for more information at our website, AmericanDemocracyMinute.org/
Granny D said, “Democracy is not something we have, it’s something we DO.”
For the American Democracy Minute, I’m Brian Beihl.