Texas Democratic Party: Moving Texas Forward

Texas Democratic Party spokesperson, Anthony Gutierrez, released the following statement regarding the San Antonio redistricting hearing:

“Voters are the ones losing in this fight over illegal Republican maps. The illegal Republican gerrymanders have halted our democracy. Different district maps and uncertain deadlines create incredible amounts of confusion for voters. This could have been completely avoided if Republicans hadn’t drawn redistricting maps that violate the Voting Rights Act. We’re glad that that the courts seem to be leaning towards not letting Republicans get away with rigging elections.”

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Dear Republican Presidential Candidates,

During the 2010 Texas gubernatorial campaign I tracked Rick Perry around the state to let people know that he was scared to debate. Well, looks like he might be chickening out again.

What you may not know is that the debate thing was just a moonlighting gig for me while I got my teaching certificate. As much fun as I had on the campaign trail, my true passion lay in education. Which is why I was so happy when I got my teaching certification and was hired to teach 7th grade biology.

Sadly, like tens of thousands of my colleagues who were new teachers, I was first on the chopping block when Rick Perry decided to cut $4 billion from public education funding while leaving $6 billion in the state’s savings account.

So, like a lot of my fellow Texas teachers, I’m now working two low-paying jobs just to make ends meet. Those are the kind of jobs Rick Perry is talking about when he says he brought jobs to Texas – the kind that you need two of to add up to a livable wage.

Anyway, I’m not looking for handouts. But I don’t want you to “let me die” either. I’m hoping one of you might be able to use my talents to let America know why Rick Perry is scared to debate.

I’m extremely photogenic and really good with the media. Check me out from this picture that I took from my press clip portfolio.

I await your call.

- Chicken

P.S. – I should mention in interest of full disclosure that I’m not a Republican. I kinda think all of you are crazy but it’s either this or chick-fil-a so I hope you’ll gimme a shot.

The Texas Democratic Party’s Deputy Executive Director, Anthony Gutierrez, released the following statement in response to the filing by the Department of Justice to deny Texas’ request for summary judgment in the redistricting case:

“Republicans intentionally discriminated against voters protected under the Voting Rights Act. The DOJ pointed to John Garza’s House District 117 as one where Hispanics would no longer be able to elect their candidate of choice.

John Garza kicked out 25,665 Hispanics from his district and specifically rejected the inclusion of politically organized Hispanics. One needs only to glance at Garza’s legislative record of betrayal to understand why he’s scared. Garza put partisan politics and his own self-interests above those of his constituents. Now he knows he has a better chance at staying in office if he violates the voting right of his constituents and draws them out of the district.”

You can read the DOJ’s filing to deny Texas’ request for summary judgment document in its entirety here.

Excerpts from the DOJ filing:

• Texas’s statement of undisputed facts is devoid of evidence or assertions in support of its claim that the proposed State House and Congressional plans lack a discriminatory purpose, in apparent non-compliance with Local Rule 7.
• There is ample circumstantial evidence of a discriminatory purpose with regard to both the State House and Congressional plans to establish a clear and genuine dispute of material facts.
• Therefore, there are genuine disputes whether proposed Districts 35, 41, and 117 provide Hispanic voters with the ability to elect their candidates of choice in the proposed plan and whether District 149 provides minority voters with the ability to elect their candidate of choice.
• Representative John Garza of District 117, in Bexar County, rejected inclusion of Hispanics in politically organized portions of the City of San Antonio and told Representative Joe Farias of neighboring District 118 that he needed “more Mexicans in [his] district.”
• The splitting of well-organized Hispanic communities in Maverick and Bexar Counties and substitution with areas that are equally Hispanic, but not politically organized, made it possible to decrease the ability of Hispanic voters to elect a candidate of their choice while still maintaining the illusion of a district with sufficient Hispanic voting age population to control elections.
• The United States contends that a purpose of the proposed State House redistricting plan is to eliminate minority communities’ ability to elect their candidate of choice in districts won by candidates not preferred by the minority voters in the watershed 2010 election.
• The proposed Congressional plan also removes hundreds of thousands of minority voters from districts that provide them with the ability to elect candidates of choice. Under the proposed plan, 479,704 fewer Hispanics would reside in such districts.

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The Texas Democratic Party’s Deputy Executive Director, Anthony Gutierrez, released the following statement in response to the filing by the Department of Justice to deny Texas’ request for summary judgment in the redistricting case:

“There is no doubt that the Perry-signed redistricting maps deliberately violate the voting rights of Texans. Republicans threw the Voting Rights Act out the window when they racially gerrymandered their districts.

The illegal Republican gerrymanders are meant to protect specific candidates at the expense of voters protected under the Voting Rights Act. After repeatedly voting against the interests of every day Texans, Republicans are using every trick in the book to try and pre-determine the outcome of elections.”

You can read the DOJ’s filing to deny Texas’ request for summary judgment document in its entirety here.

Excerpts from the DOJ filing:

• Texas’s statement of undisputed facts is devoid of evidence or assertions in support of its claim that the proposed State House and Congressional plans lack a discriminatory purpose, in apparent non-compliance with Local Rule 7.
• There is ample circumstantial evidence of a discriminatory purpose with regard to both the State House and Congressional plans to establish a clear and genuine dispute of material facts.
• The United States contends that a purpose of the proposed State House redistricting plan is to eliminate minority communities’ ability to elect their candidate of choice in districts won by candidates not preferred by the minority voters in the watershed 2010 election.
• Therefore, there are genuine disputes whether proposed Districts 35, 41, and 117 provide Hispanic voters with the ability to elect their candidates of choice in the proposed plan and whether District 149 provides minority voters with the ability to elect their candidate of choice.
• In addition, the plan is intended to prevent the emergence of new ability-to-elect districts in Dallas and Harris Counties. The proposed House redistricting plan also splits precincts in a manner that strongly evinces race-based intent, rather than a partisan purpose.
• The boundaries of proposed District 41 split fourteen precincts and include 69.5% of the Anglo VAP of the split precincts but only 40.2% of the Hispanic VAP of the split precincts. See Arrington Rep. at 30 tbl. 11. The line drawers claimed that they relied on a legislator’s local political knowledge when drawing the district. See Perez Tr. 1001:23-1002:5 (Downton); Interiano Dep. At 185:18-190:1. However the incumbent in that District denied guiding more than the small splits that included his home and excluded the legislator currently representing the District and admitted a lack of local political knowledge concerning the split precincts. See Peña Dep. At 97:16-102:15, 157:5-173:4
• Representative John Garza of District 117, in Bexar County, rejected inclusion of Hispanics in politically organized portions of the City of San Antonio and told Representative Joe Farias of neighboring District 118 that he needed “more Mexicans in [his] district.”
• The splitting of well-organized Hispanic communities in Maverick and Bexar Counties and substitution with areas that are equally Hispanic, but not politically organized, made it possible to decrease the ability of Hispanic voters to elect a candidate of their choice while still maintaining the illusion of a district with sufficient Hispanic voting age population to control elections.
• The proposed Congressional plan also removes hundreds of thousands of minority voters from districts that provide them with the ability to elect candidates of choice. Under the proposed plan, 479,704 fewer Hispanics would reside in such districts.

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Texas Democratic Party Chairman Boyd Richie released the following statement regarding Rick Perry’s “flat tax” proposal:

“Given any situation, Rick Perry can usually find a way to make it worse, and this is no exception. At a time when most Americans say millionaires should pay more in taxes, Perry proposes that they pay no taxes at all on capital gains. Like every other Republican Presidential candidate, the governor believes that working families should carry the burden while those who live off investments should pay no taxes at all.

“What’s more, Perry’s plan actually makes the tax code more complicated – not less – because under his plan we would have to calculate our taxes two ways instead of one.

“Rick Perry’s tax plan eliminates massive sources of revenue for the country, further endangering our education, health care and transportation systems – programs Perry has all but destroyed in Texas. After ten years of the Governor at the helm, Texas has a high school dropout crisis, leads the nation in uninsured residents and is still fuming from Perry’s Trans-Texas Corridor boondoggle.

“Perry’s “flat tax” plan falls flat on its face, and it looks like Governor Perry is bent on taking the rest of the country down the same disastrous path he took Texas.”

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Dear Friend,

I had planned to write you about the regressive flat tax proposal that Governor Rick Perry will unveil later today. We thought that sounded like red meat for GOP primary voters – but then, over the weekend, the Governor took it a step further and reached out to those in his party with a very tenuous grip on reality.

In an interview, Perry flirted with birtherism with all the grace of a lumbering elephant and then – I wish we were joking – invoked Donald Trump as the inspiration of his insane assertion. Evidently the two had a meeting of the minds over dinner recently.

As Texans, we have more than enough experience with Rick Perry’s approach to policy. We know he’s long on pandering rhetoric and very, very short on ideas to address anything most people care about – like an actual plan to create jobs and restore economic security for the middle class. That brings us back to his flat tax proposal. It will raise taxes on middle and working class people while treating Wall Street types to massive tax breaks. About the plan, people like Steve Forbes say “People’s mouths will water.” That should give you an idea of who stands to benefit here. Meanwhile, the other Republican contenders continue to offer up the same bad ideas that got us into this economic mess.

Fortunately, our President has a plan. This week, he began a new effort to urge Congress to act on the American Jobs Act, one piece after another, to get Americans working again and grow our economy. President Obama needs our help to tell Congress that “We Can’t Wait” to pass the plan. Visit the American Jobs Act website to get up to speed on the details and add your name to the petition. Then, you can share it via email, Facebook or Twitter.

Together, we can put into effect the meaningful reforms we want to see, while seeing that politicians like Rick Perry get a hard dose of reality on the national stage. Thank you so much for being part of that effort.

Boyd L. Richie

Chairman of your Texas Democratic Party

(Austin, TX) – Today, the Texas Democratic Party sent an open records request to Rep. Larry Gonzales (click here). In an interview with Austin’s YNN News regarding SB 14, the voter ID bill, Gonzales unequivocally stated that no one will be disenfranchised once all forms of ID allowable under SB 14 are factored in. The TDP is requesting the data Gonzales possesses to demonstrate his claim, pursuant to the state open records law, Tex. Gov’t Code Ann. Secs. 552.001 to 552.353.

In the YNN “Capital Tonight” interview airing October 14^th, in regard to the over 600,000 voters the Texas Secretary of State reports lack the state-issued driver’s license or identification card, Gonzales stated:

“What the Democrats aren’t taking into consideration is, the numbers they saw do not include all 7 forms of identification. It only includes a few of them. We feel confident that once all the forms are included, no one will be disenfranchised and people will have access to the polls, and remember, it’s all about voter integrity in the first place.”

“Rep. Gonzales made a bold claim in defense of a bill that will disenfranchise his own constituents,” said TDP Spokeswoman Kirsten Gray. “His explanation just doesn’t pass the smell test and he’s obviously desperate to defend his purely partisan support for this discriminatory bill.”

The Republican voter ID law that Gonzales is defending is currently being reviewed for preclearance under the Voting Rights Act by the Department of Justice.

We know that nearly 604,000 Texans who are currently registered to vote have neither a Texas Driver’s License or Personal Identification Card (form of ID), according to documentation provided to the Department of Justice by the Texas Secretary of State.

To illustrate why Rep. Gonzales’ claim is a long-shot, here is a review of the other allowable forms of ID under SB 14:

• Texas Concealed Handgun License: According to PolitiFact Texas, only 1.8% of Texans have a CHL. According to the Texas Tribune, those that have the CHL are wealthier as a group.
• U.S. Military ID Card: 2009 U.S. Census numbers for on-base military show 131,548 for active duty military and 56, 367 for National Guard/Reserve.
• U.S. Passport: According to CNN, only 30% of Americans have a Passport. It doesn’t stand to reason that many Texans have a Passport but no Driver’s License or Personal Identification card.

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El “milagro” de Texas de Rick Perry es un modelo económico que debe asustar a las familias trabajadoras,” dijo Rebecca Acuña, vocera del Partido Demócrata de Texas. “Es una formula muy simple. Combina los empleos de bajos salarios, altos índices de pobreza, y una de las estructuras tributarias más desigual en el país y el resultado es Texas bajo Rick Perry.”

Bajo el liderazgo de Rick Perry, el 23 por ciento de los residentes del estado y el 34 por ciento de los Latinos viven en la pobreza. El ingreso promedio en Texas es más bajo que la media nacional y la tasa de pobreza más alta.

Texas tiene uno de los sistemas de impuestos más regresivos en todo el país. Los Tejanos más pobres pagan el 12.2 por ciento de sus ingresos en impuestos estatales y locales mientras que el uno por ciento más rico paga solo el tres por ciento. Texas es uno de solo siete estados que no ofrecen crédito fiscal contra la pobreza. Por estas razones, el sistema de impuestos de Texas es el quinto más regresivo, el cual significa que las familias de bajos y medianos ingresos pagan una proporción mucho mayor de sus ingresos en impuestos que los ricos.

Debido a nuestra estructura tributaria no-equitativa, los individuos en el 20 por ciento de la escala de ingresos pagan más de tres veces y media una proporción tan grande de sus ingresos en impuestos como individuos en el uno por ciento.

Nuestro estado tiene la mayor proporción de empleos de bajos salarios en el país. De acuerdo con el Centro de Prioridades de Políticas Públicas, más de medio millón de trabajadores de Texas ganan el salario mínimo o menos. En el 2010, casi un millón de residentes en Texas estaban desempleados en un punto. Aproximadamente 336,000 de ellos estuvieron desempleados por seis meses o más.

Las políticas promovidas por el gobernador y sus legisladores republicanos durante la última sesión legislativa solo lograrán empeorar a estas estadísticas.

Via Quorum Report:

Deduct registered voters without photo id in these districts and likely Latino participation drops even more: Hispanic Republicans of Texas decline to comment

Texas Republicans touted the triumph of five Hispanic candidates in the 2010 elections as proof that their outreach to Hispanic voters is finally bearing fruit. Leaders in the state Republican Party have hardly made a secret of the fact that they see making inroads into the Hispanic vote as a requisite to the party’s long term viability.

Today, the Texas Democratic Party took advantage of a visit to El Paso by George W. Bush’s nephew, George P., to try to poke holes in this narrative. The younger Bush is affiliated with the Hispanic Republicans of Texas, a group set up to push Latino GOP candidates.

The Dems said today that Republicans used the redistricting process this year to depopulate by 180,536 the Hispanic population in the House districts represented by Hispanic Republicans. Those six GOP members are: Raul Torres, John Garza, Larry Gonzales, Jose Aliseda, Dee Margo and Aaron Peña. QR readers will recall that Peña switched parties just prior to the legislative session.

Under the maps enacted by the Legislature, Peña lost the most Hispanics in his district – 76,539. QR readers will again recall that Peña’s district was mostly swapped with that of McAllen Democrat Veronica Gonzales. The switch was one of the aspects of the new maps red-flagged by the U.S. Department of Justice, which is challenging the granting of pre-clearance to the Texas House and congressional maps by a D.C. Court panel.

The only lawmaker of the six to see the Hispanic population in his House district increase is Aliseda – by 9,500. In a bit of irony, he’s also the only member of the group to announce that he’s not running for re-election.

(To see the complete breakdown of how the Hispanic populations decreased in these lawmakers’ districts, consult the TDP press release here.)

In addition, Democrats say that of the 127,518 registered voters in these six HD’s who show no record of having a driver’s license or DPS-issued photo ID, more than 73,000 are Hispanic.

Democrats say that the voters who lack those forms of ID are in danger of being disenfranchised because of theVoter ID law passed by Republicans in the Legislature this year. And they emphasized today that the majority of those potentially disenfranchised voters in the Hispanic Republicans’ districts are Hispanic.

Trey Newton of the Hispanic Republicans of Texas told QR this afternoon that the group would have no comment on the TDP’s press release.

State Rep. Mike Villarreal (D-San Antonio) made his own set of analyses that he shared with members of the press during session while the maps were being formulated. His conclusion was that the Hispanic House Republican candidates were winning through Anglo support and not through Hispanic support.

Today, he told QR, “Clearly the Republican leadership wanted to remove Hispanic voters from these districts. These Hispanic Republicans didn’t get a lot of Hispanic votes in the first place, and they are going to have an even harder time after Republicans slashed public education and financial aid for deserving college students.”

For now, the Legislature’s maps are on hold while a couple of Voting Rights Act reviews are conducted. It’s looking more and more likely that action in the D.C. court on pre-clearance won’t happen in time to have a permanent map in place for the March 2012 primaries.

That leaves the court panel in San Antonio (which is overseeing the other VRA review) in the position of preparing interim maps that would hold for this election cycle. Those maps might look a lot different from the maps we’ve seen from legislators. That’s because the judges are not as likely to allow the House districts they draw to vary as much from the ideal district population.

The House maps as passed by the Lege vary as much as 4.9 percent below ideal population to 5.02 percent above ideal population. That 9.92 percent variation is just below the 10 percent variability widely thought to be the absolute limit that would be allowed under a VRA review.

By the way, here’s how far the six Hispanic Republican House members’ districts vary from the ideal population:

Raul Torres: 3.29 percent above ideal population

John Garza: 2.15 percent above

Larry Gonzales: 0.98 percent below

Jose Aliseda: 2.89 percent above

Dee Margo: 4.20 percent below

Aaron Peña: 4.41 percent below

With the United States Senate set to vote on the American Jobs Act today, Texas Democratic Party Spokeswoman Kirsten Gray released the following statement:

“It’s time for Republicans in Washington and the GOP presidential candidates to support this important legislation that will help middle class families and our economy.  The bottom line is that Republicans don’t have a plan of their own that would create jobs, and they should quit their obstructionist antics and support President Obama’s plan that will provide immediate action.

“The American Jobs Act will mean key investments in education and a positive economic impact for our families. For Americans looking for work, for teachers who want to stay in their classroom and for police and firefighters who want to protect their communities, there is no time for delay. It’s time for Republicans in Congress to vote for American values and pass the Jobs Act.”

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