The U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals has reversed a decades-old precedent that allows different racial and ethnic groups to form coalitions to seek legal remedies under the Voting Rights Act. The ruling will likely be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
In 2021, the Republican-majority government of Galveston County, Texas redrew its political boundaries to eliminate the one district in which non-white voters represented a majority. A group of current and former officeholders sued, charging that violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which bans racial gerrymandering. They were joined by multiple civil rights groups and the Biden administration, in a case that was consolidated as Petteway v. Galveston County.
The county argued that neither Blacks nor Latinos alone constituted an outright majority anywhere in its boundaries and that Section 2 does not protect the rights of different racial or ethnic groups to form coalitions.
On Thursday, the U.S. 5th Circuit ruled 12-5 in favor of Galveston County, throwing out a precedent its own judges had set in 1988, Campos v. City of Baytown.