By The Editors
On June 3, the NAACP Legal Defense And Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF), released a report, Independent Redistricting Commissions: Reforming Redistricting Without Reversing Progress Toward Racial Equality, to provide an overview of IRCs and examine their potential impact on minority voting rights. The report also urges voters to be vigilant in monitoring any late efforts to change the rules that govern the way redistricting lines are drawn.

By Dale Ho
“Prison-based gerrymandering” is a practice whereby many states and local governments count incarcerated persons as residents of the areas where they are housed when election district lines are drawn. This practice distorts our democratic process by artificially inflating the population count-and thus, the political influence-of the districts where prisons and jails are located.

By The Editors
The effort of the Obama administration to restore the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division as an agent of the nation’s civil rights laws has apparently shifted into high gear.