Politico notes that “the redistricting wars are about to hit North Carolina, and Republicans in the Tar Heel State are considering a controversial but well-worn strategy that has worked elsewhere in the South: Create a new majority-minority district while destroying other districts occupied by white Democrats.”  “The state’s Republicans — who are in control of the General Assembly for the first time since Reconstruction — are basically planning to blow up the current congressional map and give North Carolina a third district that has a large enough minority population to elect another African-American member of Congress. But in doing so, they’ll be drawing new lines that would secure the political safety and expand the ranks of the state’s congressional Republicans.”

The Obama DOJ needs to remember that the Voting Rights Act was designed to protect minority communities and not the partisan electoral needs of white Democrats who wish to retain power despite being badly beaten at the polls.  The addition of new majority minority seats in the North Carolina state legislature and U.S. Congress may have the Democrats complaining loudly but such a move is certainly not retrogressive toward minority voters.  As DOJ will likely interpret the law on retrogression with partisan effect, North Carolina should simply go straight to court.  Regardless, these plans end up being litigated in court for some reason. 

For decades, North Carolina Democrats unnaturally retained their political power by redistricting on race and actually minimizing the number of majority minority seats, not reflecting the large black population.  Now North Carolina Republicans finally have the opportunity to reshape the lines of North Carolina to reflect the electoral realities of the state and empower both newly resurgent Republicans and signficiant minority populations.