Gerrymandered maps in North Carolina resulted in an HBCU being split between two districts.
Now This News explored the issue in a short documentary, and the findings are staggering.
The GOP took over the state in 2011 and almost immediately redrew the electoral districts in a manner critics claim took advantage of race to maintain power.
“They decided to draw redistricting plans for both chambers of the General Assembly and congressional districts that packed Black voters into as few districts as possible thus limiting their overall influence and political power,” said Alison Riggs, a senior attorney for the Southern Coalition of Social Justice.
“We knew from the get-go that this wasn’t right. We see these crazy-shaped districts with appendages and arms. We overlaid them with racial data and we were like, ‘wow, it’s an exact match,’” she said.
North Carolina A&T State University, the largest HBCU in the country, was initially drawn into the snake-shaped District 12, overseen by Democrat Alma Adams. After the changes, half of the university sits in District 13, and the other lies in the Sixth District.
Adams called her area “the most gerrymandered district in the nation.”
After the 2011 maps were ruled unconstitutional, the districts were redrawn again in 2016. GOP State Representative David Lewis was clear about his intentions during a 2016 debate of the plans.
“I propose that we draw the maps to give a partisan advantage to 10 Republicans and three Democrats because I do not believe it is possible to draw a map with 11 Republicans and two Democrats,” Lewis stated. “It is to gain partisan advantage on the map. I want that criteria to be clearly stated and understood.”
Riggs said the GOP “turned off the race button” and called their method “partisan gerrymandering” because that makes it legal.
In the video, two students illustrate the impact of this move by standing on opposite sides of the same street, putting them in different districts. The Republican Party’s antics have inspired the students of NCAT to become activists.
“I don’t think we came into this space knowing that we were organizers,” said senior Braxton Brewington. “But, rather, we saw an issue on campus and wanted to know what we could do to go about correcting this issue or at least drawing attention to it.”
Sam King, another senior, believes fighting gerrymandering is the key to fair elections.
“If you really want people’s voices to not be silenced anymore, gerrymandering is something we really have to tackle and address,” said King. “It’s not enough to want change. You actually have to gather together and make that change yourself.”
The students plan to organize a march to the polls on Election Day, something they have done for past elections. Josette Ferguson, North Carolina’s state director of NextGen America, thinks the youth could be a catalyst for change.
“The power of the youth vote is being able to know that if I vote, not just me but my friends and my friend’s friends and their friends,” she said. “If we all vote, we will be able to make a blue wave happen, and some big change happen in terms of November.”
Watch the whole documentary below:
Republicans split a Black college in half to win elections in this state — but this isn't anything new for the GOP pic.twitter.com/qHg1msRwoU
— NowThis (@nowthisnews) October 17, 2018
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