HARLINGEN — The Texas Supreme Court has dismissed a lawsuit charging the city’s new single-member district boundaries unconstitutionally moved thousands of District 2 registered voters into District 3, denying their right to vote for commissioner in the May election.
On Friday, the court didn’t issue an opinion after dropping the lawsuit filed Monday by former City Commissioners Tudor Uhlhorn and Jay Meade and their wives, requesting justices void the new single-member district boundaries or order commissioners call a special May 7 election for the city’s five districts.
In response, Uhlhorn, his wife Hellen, and Meade and his wife Elena, issued a statement standing by their charge of voter suppression while arguing Commissioners Richard Uribe, Frank Puente and Rene Perez proposed their new district map without giving residents time to address their concerns.
“Obviously, we are disappointed with the Supreme Court’s decision and do not agree with it,” Uhlhorn, Meade and their wives stated.
“We suspect the court felt there was just too little time to decide such an important voting rights issue. Perhaps, that is exactly why the three commissioners pushing this unconstitutional plan waited until just a few days before the candidate filing period begins (Jan. 19) to even present their plan. The Census data required for redistricting has been available since last September but the plan supported by Commissioners Uribe, Puente, and Perez was never made publicly available until the day before it was adopted on Jan. 5.”
“Although we are deeply disappointed by the Supreme Court’s ‘hands-off’ decision, we believe this effort focused attention on the facts that Commissioners Uribe, Puente and Perez don’t really care whether all Harlingen citizens get to vote and they were just fine with no public input into their secret plan and with no one knowing what they were up to until they thought it was too late to do anything about it. It is not too late for Harlingen citizens to let them know how they feel about what has occurred.”
Meanwhile, Puente argued city officials presented commissioners with a proposed redistricting plan without giving them time to discuss options, including their plan.
Charging voter suppression
In their statement, Uhlhorn, Meade and their wives stood by their charge of voter suppression.
“The justices of the Texas Supreme Court decided this morning that they will not get involved in the dispute regarding district boundaries for Harlingen city commissioners including the May 7 election of commissioners for Districts 1 and 2,” they stated. “As a result, almost 4,000 Harlingen citizens have been stripped of their vote by City Commissioners Richard Uribe, Frank Puente, and Rene Perez.”
In the statement, they cited the Supreme Court’s decision earlier this month against addressing a similar issue involving an election which was being conducted in the case in which a sole redistricting plan was proposed.
However, in Harlingen’s case, commissioners offered four redistricting proposals, including two options which wouldn’t have denied residents their right to vote in the May election, they stated.
“Because of those differences, we were hopeful that the justices on the Supreme Court would be willing to intervene and protect our constitutional right to vote,” they argued.
“The court did not issue an opinion this morning or give any explanation at all why they are unwilling to decide whether the redistricting map adopted by the three Harlingen city commissioners is or is not constitutional,” they stated. “That lack of explanation is also disappointing. However, it is very important for Commissioners Uribe, Puente and Perez to understand that the Supreme Court did not say that they approve of or endorse the adopted plan or the resulting suppression of votes.”
Puente accuses Uhlhorn, Meade of ‘misleading the public’
Meanwhile, Puente accused Uhlhorn and Meade of “misleading the public.”
“Justice prevails,” he said during an interview. “I didn’t think (the lawsuit) held any water based on their factually incorrect information misleading the public about voter suppression when they knew this was perfectly legal and these districts are perfectly fine. I can’t emphasize how much thought we put into this, making sure it was fair and it fairly represents all our constituents.”
In a statement, Perez described the lawsuit as “frivolous.”
“This quick dismissal just proves that this was a frivolous lawsuit with no real merit,” he stated, describing the new district map’s boundaries as “constitutional.”
Perez indicated the redistricting plans’ staggered election cycles are constitutional.
“Unfortunately, redistricting can cause disruption but in this case there was no true voter suppression,” he stated. “This was pure political theater by two former commissioners and the current mayor.”
In response, Mayor Chris Boswell stood by his charges of voter suppression.
“I don’t think it’s political theater to stand up for people whose votes were taken away from them in this year’s election,” he said during an interview. “What Commissioners Uribe, Puente and Perez said is, their vote is not important and, in my view, that’s very, very wrong.”
The lawsuit
On Monday, Brenham-based attorney Andy Taylor filed the lawsuit against Uribe, Puente and Perez, the City Commission and the city of Harlingen, requesting justices “invalidate” the new redistricting plan or order commissioners to call a May 7 special election for the city’s five voting districts.
“Under the Harlingen City Charter and the redistricting plan which has been in effect for the past decade, registered voters residing in Districts 1 and 2 were constitutionally entitled to vote for their candidates of choice in the next round of the Harlingen city commission elections in May 2022,” the lawsuit states.
“By moving registered voters from Precincts 32 and 35 within District 2 to District 3, (the new plan) illegally and unconstitutionally stripped those specific registered voters of their constitutionally protected right to vote under the Texas Constitution because there are voters from Precincts 32 and 35 that will not have the opportunity to vote again until 2024, when the elections for District 3 are scheduled to be held.”
The lawsuit states Uribe, Puente and Perez failed to adopt two proposed plans which gave all residents the right to vote in the May election.
Uhlhorn, Meade and their wives argue Uribe, Puente and Perez didn’t have “the discretion to do what they did, which was to ‘remedy’ the population inequality by needlessly and gratuitously disenfranchising thousands of voters where, as was the case here, population equality can be otherwise achieved,” the lawsuit states.
