NAACP says Tennessee redistricting intentionally discriminates on basis of race

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON, May 13 (Reuters) – U.S. civil rights group NAACP said on Wednesday the new congressional map approved last week by Tennessee Republicans intentionally discriminated on the basis of race against Black voters.

• The United States’ largest civil rights group said it filed a federal lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee.

• The lawsuit alleges Tennessee lawmakers “intentionally redrew Congressional District 9 – a district anchored in Memphis for more than 50 years – to crack the majority-Black district across multiple districts, with the intent of eliminating Black voting power and depriving them of a meaningful opportunity to elect candidates of their choice,” the NAACP said.

• Tennessee Republicans approved a new congressional map last week, as several other Southern states seek to leverage a U.S. Supreme Court decision from late April that severely weakened the landmark Voting Rights Act.

• The redistricting plan “violates the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution by intentionally discriminating on the basis of race,” NAACP said.

• Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett and the state Election Commission had no immediate comment on the suit in which their offices were named as defendants.

• Republican President Donald Trump launched a national ​mid-decade redistricting battle⁠ between Democrats and Republicans last year ahead of this year’s midterm elections.

• The Republican Party is aiming in the elections to retain its current thin majorities in the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate.

• Republican-led states are moving to test new limits of minority-vote protections following the Supreme Court’s April 29 decision.

• Civil rights groups have sued to challenge the redrawing of districts that have a significant population of communities of color.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; additional reporting by Bianca Flowers; Editing by Lincoln Feast.)