As Maryland’s redistricting process begins, African Americans in and out of state government are increasingly split over whether their top priority should be to push to redraw lines to ensure better representation for blacks or to protect Maryland’s white incumbents because of the coveted positions of power they have attained on Capitol Hill.
Maryland’s legislative black caucus has endorsed a strategy to protect incumbents’ districts while “preserving and strengthening” the two that are represented by African Americans. A grass-roots group in Prince George’s County, backed by the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and the Southern Coalition for Social Justice, says that’s not good enough.
At a hearing Monday in Prince George’s, the group plans to propose a dramatic shake-up of Maryland’s congressional map to put together a district whose voters might readily elect a third black Maryland member of Congress.
If that plan, or any other to create another majority African American district, were adopted, it would throw into question the reelection prospects of House Minority Whip Rep. Steny H. Hoyer and other Maryland Democratic incumbents.
“The goal is not necessarily to upend Steny Hoyer or any other politician. If they get reelected, that’s great,” said Trevor Otts, co-chairman of the grass-roots group, the Fannie Lou Hamer Political Action Committee. “To do what’s fair, you can’t put who’s getting elected first. If you look at our history, especially in Maryland, we have been drawing [districts] to make sure incumbents get reelected. Whether or not that process harms the community is not something we’ve adequately considered.”
Democrats control redistricting in Maryland. Behind the scenes, several people close to the process say Hoyer will have a big say in how his and other congressional districts are redrawn. It’s highly unlikely, they say, that Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) and the state’s Democratic-controlled General Assembly, which is scheduled to convene to vote on a new map in October, would support putting Hoyer’s seat, or that of any of the party’s incumbents, in immediate jeopardy.
However, the Fannie Lou Hamer PAC, which is named after a Mississippi voting rights activist who died in 1977, is threatening that if districts are not redrawn to mirror the voting power of Maryland’s minorities, it will take the state to court. Many of Maryland’s legislative lines involving black communities were decided by judges after legal challenges to the state’s redistricting 10 years ago.
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