Career Lawyers in DOJ Overruled on Delay Redistricting

So, the Washington Post is reporting that career lawyers in the Department of Justice unanimously agreed that Tom Delay's Texas redistricting plan was illegal.

The lawyers at DOJ concluded the Delay plan was illegal, because it violated the Voting Rights Act and diluted African-American and Hispanic voting strength in two districts.

BUT, the lawyers were overruled by senior political appointees at DOJ. The political appointees at Justice approved the plan.

And Mark Posner, who for a long time was a lawyer at DOJ, says those actions are suspect. He says it's very unusual for political appointees at DOJ to overrule career lawyers in the Department.

I'm covering this on my blog:

http://progressiveminds.bloghi.com/2005/12/02/justice-department-lawyers-overruled-on-texas-re-districting.html

Sounds like it could mean more trouble for DeLay! I clapped!!!!!

After all, the political appointees (AKA: Bush's lapdogs; BKA: Bush's whores) approved the plan, in spite of the findings of the career lawyers.

It just serves as further proof of what we in the reality-based community already knew: Tom Delay is concerned with one thing only: his political power and viability.

And African-Americans and Hispanics don't support him, so he tries to dilute their voting power.

justice dept lawyers advised against it. I doubt it was because they weren't supporting getting more Pubs elected. It had to be something else! I don't know very much about this part of the laws so I can't even guess, but I do nknow lawyers don't davise against something without a reason.

I'm going to watch this issue and see what happens!

They said it was illegal. They said it violated the Voting Rights Act by suppressing the voting power of African-Americans and Hispanics in 2 districts.


But higher up in the chain of command, the political appointees approved it--which, unfortunately, doesn't come as a shocker.

the Admin. politicos who ignored them!