Red Wine & Blue
Red Wine & Blue is a national community of over half a million diverse suburban women working together to defeat extremism, one friend at a time. We train and connect women from across the country of all political backgrounds, including many who have never been political before, to get sh*t done and have fun along the way.
We launched "The Suburban Women Problem" podcast in May of 2021, and after 5 seasons and 1.3 million downloads, we brought the show to an end to pave the way for new podcasts out of Red Wine & Blue. Subscribe and stay tuned in to hear brand new series, starting with "Okay, But Why?"
There's so much happening in politics right now, it’s hard to keep up. It feels like every day, there’s a new outrageous headline. But it’s not always clear why these things are happening. So in this weekly series of short shareable episodes, we’re here to ask… “Okay, But Why?”
When they go low, we go local. We hope you join us.
Red Wine & Blue
Okay, But Why Is Gerrymandering Legal?
Gerrymandering is one of those things that makes people tune out of politics. It doesn’t just sound technical and complicated, it feels so far outside our control. But it’s important to understand because we all deserve to have our votes count. Gerrymandering is basically politicians picking their voters, instead of the other way around. And in Texas, Democratic reps like Ann Johnson are standing up for voters.
Both parties have been known to participate in gerrymandering, but over the past few decades, it’s mostly been Republicans manipulating the maps. That’s not political speculation — many Republican leaders have come right out and said so. They even have an official project, named Operation REDMAP, which stands for Republican Redistricting Majority Project. And unfortunately, so far the project has been extremely successful.
You may wonder… how is this even legal?
Racial gerrymandering has been outlawed since the Voting Rights Act of 1965, but the Supreme Court keeps ruling that partisan gerrymandering is fine. So what’s happening in Texas, where President Trump asked Republican reps to redraw district lines to favor himself, may be wrong and anti-democratic but it’s not illegal. As Rep. Mitch Little said in an interview, “we’re doing it because we can.”
We’re grateful to Democratic representatives like Ann Johnson who are fighting back against gerrymandering. And we’re very excited that she’ll be joining Red Wine & Blue on Monday to talk about what’s going on in Texas! You can sign up for our Don’t Mess With Texas virtual event here.
For a transcript of this episode, please email comms@redwine.blue.
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