The top Georgia House Democrat on Monday accused her Republican colleagues of working to systematically eliminate white Democrats in the General Assembly.
House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams, D-Atlanta, told more than 300 people at a panel discussion on voting rights that the looming Republican plan for redistricting pairs many white Democrats into districts currently led by black Democrats.
Republicans who are controlling the process, she said, plan to create 49 "majority-minority" House districts, an increase of seven over the current configuration. "They accomplished this by purging the state of Georgia of white Democrats," Abrams, who is black, said. "Almost without exception in the Fulton-DeKalb area, if you are a white Democrat who is near an African-American, you were paired and you are going to have to run against one another."
Rep. Roger Lane, R-Darien, the chairman of the House committee on redistricting, said Abrams' comments don't have "any validity" and weren't worthy of comment. Lane added, however, that a draft map would be released on Friday for public examination.
House Speaker David Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, with whom Abrams has enjoyed a positive relationship, said he was "disappointed Democratic leadership in the House would stoop this low."
The General Assembly reconvenes Monday in Atlanta for a special session on redistricting, the every 10-year process following the Census where states redraw the lines of legislative districts. It is a hugely important process to elected officials as a minor change in district lines can spell the difference between re-election and forced retirement.
Republicans control the process in Georgia by virtue of their control of the House, Senate and governor's office. But Georgia is also one of nine states that must get federal approval for any change in election law, including redistricting. Abrams said that review, required by the Voting Rights Act, will be important.
But, Abrams said Republicans are using the Voting Rights Act as a weapon because the landmark law generally prevents the dilution of minority voting strength. That means any proposed map must not feature fewer majority-minority districts than are currently featured.
"What they’ve said to every member who questioned [why] they were going to get competition … they said the Voting Rights Act made me do it," she said. "When you use suppression by inclusion it is a violation of the Voting Rights spirit. It is a craven and cynical attempt to say we as Georgians don’t know what we’re getting."
The ultimate goal for Republicans, Abrams said, is to gain a large enough majority to enact constitutional amendments without Democratic votes. It takes a two-thirds vote in each chamber to put constitutional questions on the ballot. In the House, that means 120 votes; in the Senate, it take 38. The House maps as drawn by Republicans, Abrams said, are designed to create 121 Republican seats.
Still, Abrams said, Republicans are only doing what they learned by watching Democrats in the past, when the roles of power were reversed.
"So I’m mad at all of us," she said. "Reapportionment and redistricting is not about politicians. Reapportionment is about where we live. Redistricting is about how we are represented. This is about people. It is is not about politicians. The extent to which we allow politicians to own or control the process if you’re voice isn’t heard, you deserve what you get."
Lane, the GOP leader of the redistricting process in the House, said the Census numbers showed that the state currently has 49 majority-minority districts in the House. The Voting Rights Act requires the new map to have at least that many.
"Under the Voting Rights Act we have a legal requirement to try and maintain those 49 districts," Lane said. "We have to make those districts as equal in population as possible and stay at 49."
Abrams said she met with Ralston several weeks ago, before draft maps were ready. "He warned me there would be pairings" of white and black Democrats, she said. "My thought was the pairings would be equitable. They were not."
Ralston, however, said he told Abrams "about every one" of the potential pairings.
"This process has been open," he said.
Ralston said he has included Abrams and gave her an idea of "what we were doing and thinking about doing. And then to get hit, or to have her say this tonight, ... I'm just really disappointed. I don't think she gives Georgia credit for being bigger than she thinks it is."
As for Abrams' contention that Republicans are only doing what Democrats did 10 years ago, Ralston scoffed.
"If we learned from what happened 10 years ago, we would not be releasing maps on Friday, I would not have involved her in discussions a month ago," Ralston said, adding that he "probably" will still share the draft map with Abrams and Democratic leaders before it goes public Friday.
"None of these things happened 10 years ago," he said. "To say we learned from Democrats 10 years ago is probably the most preposterous, ridiculous statement I've heard in the political process in Georgia in years."
Ralston also said the goal was not to get Republicans to 120 seats.
"No, no, no, it's not," he said. "That's not the goal. The goal is to be fair and sensible and follow the law and that's what we're doing. I don't know what the number is going to be. I truly don't."
What Republicans are doing is simply what they can, University of Georgia political scientist Charles Bullock, an expert in redistricting, said.
"The majority party certainly has the right to do what they want to do," he said. "Any Democrats who have been around for 10 years are hardly in the position to complain since the districts Democrats drew 10 years ago might be the most outrageous we've ever seen."
In the 2001 redistricting process, controlled then by Democrats, Republicans argued that they were victimized by gerrymandering, the process of drawing oddly shaped districts to benefit the majority. Then-Gov. Roy Barnes, a Democrat, was widely criticized for his personal involvement in the process that some said led to his losing re-election in 2002.
Ultimately, the courts tossed out three Senate districts that had to be redrawn.
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