Everybody knows that the redistricting map the state Legislature drew for Kansas’ congressional districts only ever had two real goals: Get rid of Democratic Rep. Sharice Davids and ensure that no non-Republican could be elected to Congress for at least the next decade.
So how refreshing it is to see a judge recognize that and strike down the map as a blatantly partisan exercise in diluting the voting strength of minorities, both political and racial.
In his 208-page ruling Monday, Wyandotte County District Judge Bill Klapper laid out step by step how Republican lawmakers — who enjoy a veto-proof majority in the Statehouse — ignored the Kansas Constitution, federal law, their own redistricting guidelines and common decency in gerrymandering the map they call Ad Astra 2.
The dominant feature of Ad Astra 2 is splitting Wyandotte County north from south.
That would surgically remove the bulk of Kansas City, Kansas’ Black voting population from Davids’ District 3 and bury those folks under an avalanche of white conservative voters in the district next door, Republican Rep. Jake La Turner’s District 2.
It also divides Lawrence, home of the University of Kansas and the only real Democratic stronghold in the state, putting half the city in the rural and overwhelmingly Republican “Big 1st” district.
Klapper also calls out the unmitigated parody of public participation that was the Legislature’s “listening tour” on redistricting.
He noted the tour took place before the release of 2020 census data necessary to comment intelligently on redistricting and that the meetings were held at inconvenient times — 10 of 14 during working hours. In urban communities where the sessions were well-attended, voters were limited to two minutes each of speaking time.
Klapper even included a telling photo of Republican lawmakers on the listening tour ostentatiously playing with their phones instead of listening to the Kansans who came to speak to them.
In the end, Klapper said, public input was ignored and the redistricting map drawn behind closed doors, by persons unknown, and then rushed through the Legislature at a breakneck speed that suppressed any legitimate debate.
Klapper’s right.
We all know what the Republican legislators did, how they did it, why they did it. They control three-fourths of the political power in the state and now they want it all. That’s clear as glass.
Their only real defense as Klapper described it, is thinking “The Legislature can redistrict in any manner it sees fit and the courts are powerless to stop its actions.”
Unfortunately, Klapper’s ruling isn’t the final word.
The Republican leadership of the Legislature is actively downplaying the ruling and the case is now headed to the state Supreme Court.
But the ruling is important and not just because of what Klapper decided.
It’s also a clarion call to set aside party for a minute and preserve the principle of free and fair elections, untainted by the manipulations of political bosses.
