While there's evidence that Arkansas's new legislative maps punish Black voters in violation of federal law, those voters don't have standing to sue over it, a judge says.
On the last day of witness testimony in a hearing about new state legislative lines, Republicans hired to do the mapping talk about what their priorities were. Amplifying the Black vote didn't really come up.
There's no doubt white Arkansas voters gained more political power at the expense of Black voters under the newly adopted state legislative district maps. There's plenty of doubt about whether anything will be done about it.
The maps pit three incumbents against each other in southeast Arkansas. The number of minority majority House districts goes up by two. At least one Democrat gets an unwelcome surprise.