Harrell wants redistricting suit thrown out
COLUMBIA -- A lawsuit over redrawing the state's new U.S. House districts should be dismissed because six black voters challenging the claims haven't proved the map is discriminatory, attorneys for the leader of the South Carolina House say.
Attorneys for House Speaker Bobby Harrell also argued in papers filed in federal court Monday that the black voters haven't presented an alternative plan for judges to consider, and some of the plaintiffs don't live in the districts challenged in the lawsuit.
Harrell is among the defendants in a lawsuit over new district lines, including the state's new 7th Congressional District along the coast. Six black voters are challenging the plan passed by the Republican-dominated state Legislature, claiming it creates "voting apartheid."
The Justice Department has said it would not challenge the new layout. The proposed maps for South Carolina and other Southern states require federal approval under the Voting Rights Act because of a history of inequitable treatment of black voters.
The lawsuit asks a three-judge panel to throw out the plan, make lawmakers draw a new one and bar any elections based on the current plan. The trial is set to begin next week.
The voters challenging the lines live in Florence, Sumter, Georgetown, Berkeley, Darlington and Charleston counties. They are suing Gov. Nikki Haley, the Legislature and other state officials and claim a race-based plan for the state's seven districts "creates a system of voting apartheid in South Carolina that segregates white and black voters into election districts" and packs black voters into one congressional district.
Redistricting is a once-a-decade process to make sure political district lines reflect population changes revealed by the U.S. Census. South Carolina is picking up a seventh U.S. House seat -- something the Palmetto State had decades ago, before population fell in 1930. That new district was added to the state's northeastern corner on the coast, and a multitude of candidates have already announced their decisions to run.
In papers filed Monday, attorneys for the black voters also say that they are dropping their claims over the state's redrawn state Senate districts. The voters are still challenging the state's House district plans.
Last week, a federal judge ruled that Harrell and Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell would not have to testify about their redistricting debate. Attorneys for the black voters had argued that state lawmakers like Harrell and McConnell are not protected by the same legislative immunity that Congress members enjoy and should therefore be compelled to testify about how lawmakers arrived at the new map.
