Texas Must Face Hispanic Voting-Rights Claims
Style Magazine Newswire | 4/7/2017, 11:30 a.m.
Source: Courthousenews.com
Hispanics in Texas will soon outnumber whites, but only two of the 18 judges on the state’s highest courts are Latino, and a federal judge refused this week to dismiss a voting-rights lawsuit taking aim at that disparity. By 2020 there will be more Hispanics than white people in Texas and by 2042, Hispanics will be the state’s majority racial group, according to the Office of the State Demographer. Joined by seven Latino Texans, LUPE sued Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott and Secretary of State Carlos Cascos in July 2016, alleging the state’s at-large system for electing judges for these courts dilutes the Latino vote in violation of the Voting Rights Act. LUPE’s first amended lawsuit urges a federal judge to stop Texas from running any elections for the two courts under the current system and to order Texas to implement a new process.
