“That legal strategy is based on attacking states or jurisdictions for their history. In other words, Holder proposes to treat Southern states based on their supposed “profile” rather than their political realities.

Trying to institutionalize Section 5’s inherent mistrust of voters and governments in the South to protect voting rights and hold fair elections is nothing short of racial and political profiling. It engenders the same two-way-street mistrust as does individual racial profiling.

It also politicizes Section 5 to the point that it becomes nothing more or less than a partisan political issue that has nothing whatsoever to do with voting rights, but rather about the outcome of elections and partisan advantage. The undeniable interjection of partisan advantage into enforcement of the Voting Right Act is what led the court’s decision to begin to dismantle it in the first place.”

Jackson Clarion Ledger.