00:00Mr. Speaker, members, everybody knows this is a standard amendment that basically kills
00:07the bill. It's called an enacting clause. So if you haven't been through this, this is
00:14just basically an amendment that kills the bill. And so I know you're going to be shocked,
00:21but I'm not going to be in favor of this particular amendment.
00:25Mr. Spiller, for what purpose?
00:28Yes. Will the gentleman yield for questions?
00:29Mr. Hunter, would you yield?
00:30Absolutely.
00:31He will.
00:32Thank you. Mr. Chairman, there's been some discussion, in fact, on this amendment relative
00:38to the Petaway case and coalition districts. I want to ask you, you've already mentioned
00:45the Petaway case in your layout, and that was the August 1st, 2024 case that the fifth circuit
00:51ruled Petaway versus Galveston County, where it said that coalition claims do not comport
00:57with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Is that correct?
01:00That's correct.
01:01And in short, so we've heard a lot of discussion about opportunity districts and so forth, but
01:08coalition districts are the subject of the Petaway case, and coalition districts are generally defined,
01:13is it to your understanding, of districts that don't have one particular minority group
01:18that make up a majority of the district, but one or more of those minority groups are combined
01:23together or aggregated to reach a majority. Is that a fair definition?
01:28That is correct.
01:28Okay. And you touched on it before in your layout, and I know we were short on time, but
01:34uh, under the current district, I mean under the current congressional maps that we're under right
01:40now, not HB4, but what we're currently under, there are coalition districts that were created as such
01:47in 21 because of the law as it existed in Texas under the fifth circuit at that time. Is that fair?
01:54That is correct. In 2020.
01:55And then, uh, in fact, that, that, uh, law that was in place when these districts, when these districts
02:02were created under 21 was the Compost versus City of Baytown case, which is a 37-year-old case,
02:11but it was the law, not necessarily throughout the country, but it was the law in the state of Texas
02:16because it was the law in the fifth circuit. That was the precedent. Is that correct?
02:20In Petaway, they referenced it, and that's what they said.
02:23Okay. So now in Texas, one of the reasons that we're doing this now is that, uh, we're,
02:31feel compelled to because of the Petaway case and the ruling in the Petaway case as it related,
02:37as it relates to, uh, these, uh, coalition districts, correct?
02:42Well, I think it's a combination, Mr. Spiller. I think you have a U.S. Supreme Court Rucho.
02:49You have a fifth circuit Petaway. The combination of both those cases are involved in this map.
02:59Right. And you mentioned also in the Rucho case that, that, uh, is a U.S. Supreme Court case that
03:04allows for partisan performance and set, in fact, uh, in, in that case, I think there were competing
03:10claims whether or not there was Republican claims, Democrat claims, uh, multiple issues there. And the
03:15court said, we're not going to get into that partisan performance is absolutely okay. And we
03:20authorize that. Yes. So the members know the U.S. Supreme Court considered two states,
03:28one Republican that were redistricting to reduce Democrat, gain Republican. Then one state Democrat
03:39that wanted to reduce Republican one who had been there 20 years. And the U.S. Supreme Court said
03:47that is not the judicial purview and political performance is a criteria.
03:53And we know that political performance can be done and, in fact, has been done in other states
04:00already. Is that correct? Absolutely. In fact, uh, there are some states that
04:04are Democrat controlled states, Democrat majority, uh, some of which are the favorite, uh, vacation
04:10spots of certain people in this room that, uh, whether it be California, New York, Illinois,
04:16New Jersey, Maryland, Massachusetts, that have already done this to a fairly, uh, extreme degree.
04:24Would that be a fair statement? That is true. I mean, this is not unique. That's why the courts have
04:30addressed it and both parties that you referenced have been involved. There's been some discussion
04:38in recently about the, some of the districts in and around Harris County. And I just want to ask you
04:44briefly on some of those. Uh, we talked about district 18, what we call the history, the Barbara
04:50Jordan historic district. When we went to Houston, we heard a lot of testimony about that, but it was
04:56under HB four, it was, it's currently one of these coalition districts and under HB four, uh, changes
05:03to a majority black CVAP district. Is that correct? That is correct. It is now 50.71 percent black CVAP
05:15in 2021. It was 38.99 percent black. And so previously, uh, black voters in that
05:25district did not hold a majority, but under your bill, under HB four, they actually do. Is that
05:30correct? That is correct. All right. And, uh, we also heard a lot about compactness and you think
05:36that's what you've done generally with HB four, uh, but, but specifically in Harris County as well,
05:43dealt with that issue of compactness. Can you touch on that? Yes. You know,
05:47even though public hearings may have opposition or support, we heard from public in those hearings
05:58about the compactness issue. And one of the issues was the Austin to San Antonio district and why they
06:07felt that should be looked at same thing in Houston, they looked at 18 to the original rather than how
06:17it has spread out over the years. So yes, compactness has been involved. Okay. And also in relative to
06:26Harris County, we talked about district nine, uh, which was also, uh, second one in Harris County,
06:34a coalition district and, uh, the district that was addressed in the pedway case. And now under your
06:40HB four changed from my coalition district to a majority Hispanic CBAP district. Is that correct?
06:46Yes. For the record, the Hispanic CBAP of congressional district nine under this plan,
06:55the Hispanic CBAP is 50.15%. In 2021, it was 25.73%. All right. And, and, and I'm trying to move
07:06quickly, but on district 29, one of the other districts out of Harris County, uh, we've heard
07:11some testimony or some questions about that today. We heard testimony about it in the committee,
07:16but it went from a majority Hispanic CBAP district to a majority Hispanic VAP district. Uh, but should,
07:24is it, is it a fair statement that it would, should continue to perform as a Democrat district?
07:31Let me give you the information on 29, because I just heard some of that so that everybody knows
07:3929 has gone from a black CBAP in 18.31% in 2021 to now 32.3%.
07:5430.79%. As they said, Hispanic CBAP decreased, but to 43.12%. So you basically have Hispanic black percentage
08:09that is plus 70. The other note is that the political performance in 29 stays Democrat. Right. And likewise,
08:23the other district I want to talk about in Harris County was district seven. We heard quite a bit
08:26of testimony, uh, regarding district seven in the committee. Uh, and it was a very diverse district,
08:33but I think it remains a very diverse district. And I think also continues to be Democrat. It has
08:39a Democrat representative, uh, Congresswoman. I think it will continue to perform Democrat
08:44in that district. Is that correct? Yeah. The data on seven is that it has increased slightly more Democrat
08:54performance. The other characteristics do not change, but under seven, if you look at the new numbers,
09:03uh, they're very, very close to what they were. All right. And these, this claim, uh, that a lot of
09:13this stuff is, is racially motivated and, and, uh, race negative. Let me ask you, and you've touched
09:19on it before, but we went under the current map from zero majority black CBAP districts in the state
09:25of Texas. And now under your map, we added two, uh, to that list where there, there, there are two
09:31majority black CBAP districts, correct? Correct. 18. And, uh, uh, is, is one of the ones that we've
09:38talked about in 30. And under the current map, we have seven, uh, majority Hispanic CBAP districts,
09:46and that is increased under HB4 under your bill, uh, to eight. So we're adding one more majority, uh,
09:53Hispanic CBAP district, majority Hispanic VAP districts. The gentleman's time is expired.
10:02Your speaker.
