On Thursday, Eric Holder’s Department of Justice announced a lawsuit against Texas over the state’s voter identification law, claiming that the law violated the Voting Rights Act, the 14^th Amendment to the Constitution, and the 15^th Amendment to the Constitution. The Justice Department is joining another lawsuit challenging redistricting in the state. The Supreme Court decided last month that Texas no longer required pre-clearance from the federal government in order to create voting laws. Eric Holder’s DOJ won’t take no for an answer, accusing Texas of adopting the law “with the purpose, and will have the result, of denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race, color, or membership in a language minority group.”Holder said in a statement, “Today’s action marks another step forward in the Justice Department’s continuing effort to protect the voting rights of all eligible Americans. We will not allow the Supreme Court’s recent decision to be interpreted as open season for states to pursue measures that suppress voting rights.”
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) fired back, saying that the DOJ was “inserting itself into the sovereign affairs of Texas… As Texans we reject the notion that the federal government knows what’s best for us. We deserve the freedom to make our own laws and we deserve not to be insulted by a Justice Department committed to scoring cheap political points.”
Recent surveys show that in the 2012 election, black turnout in the state of Texas was 86.2 percent, substantially higher than any other major ethnic group.
Ben Shapiro is Editor-At-Large of Breitbart News and author of the New York Times bestseller “Bullies: How the Left’s Culture of Fear and Intimidation Silences America” (Threshold Editions, January 8, 2013).
Reported by Breitbart 12 hours ago.