Denial of minority rights in some parts of the United States: UN expert | Election News

A special UN rapporteur says the narrowing of Texas votes restricts the rights of ethnic minorities, and causes “gerrymandering”.

A human rights expert from the United Nations has denounced measures in some parts of the United States, including Texas, that could undermine democracy by denying millions of people in visible minority groups the right to vote.

Fernand de Varennes said on the last day of his two-week official visit to the United States on Monday that Texas law has led to a reduction in “gerrymandering” and the voting rights of ethnic minorities. in favor of whites.

“Unfortunately it is almost a tyranny of the majority, where the right to vote for the minority is being denied in many areas, in parts of the country,” de Varennes, the UN’s special rapporteur on minority issues, said in a news release. conference.

De Varennes called for a “New Deal” to renew the legislation. The U.S. had no immediate reaction to its preliminary observations, and the UN expert said it shared it with U.S. State Department officials the same day.

His comments came after he first joined the US a list of democracies, in part because of the sheer number of state laws passed in recent months that make it harder for some voters to vote.

“Research indicates that voter registration and voting laws in some states, recently passed or under discussion, adversely affect minorities in a negative way,” the report by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Support said.PDF).

U.S. Department of Justice sue Earlier this month in Texas in a controversial state law known as SB1 for “some restrictive voting procedures,” the department said it violates federal voting and civil rights laws.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed SB1 enacted the law in September, arguing that measures backed by Republicans would help combat voter fraud. But civil rights groups and other observers said the legislation aims to make it more difficult for democratically lean minorities to vote.

Among other measures, SB1 banned car-going and 24-hour voting locations, added new identification requirements for postal voting, limited who could help voters in need of language barriers or disabilities, and allowed biased polls.

Texas was one of a dozen states that approved vote changes since the 2020 presidential election, driven by former President Donald Trump. false claims that the vote was confused by widespread fraud.

The Brennan Center for Justice, a research center at New York University that documents U.S. voting rights legislation, said at least 19 states have enacted 33 laws that make it harder for Americans to vote from Jan. 1 to Sept. 27 this year.

Texas SB1 legislation “makes it difficult for Latino, black, and Asian voters and those with disabilities or language disabilities to receive support to vote.” he said center, which contains throw the challenge law in U.S. courts.

“It was difficult to vote, [SB1] It increases the barriers that Texas voters face, ”he said.

This month, there were also lawsuits Presented in Texas On congressional redistricting maps, critics said they were “diluting the voting power of communities of color” by giving political voters a political impact that exceeds that of the state’s population.

He gave the state two more seats this year in the U.S. House of Representatives due to population growth.

“Texas added two million Latinos to its population in the 2020 census, and yet Republicans in the state have still found a way to make it a gerrymander and avoid adding districts that represent that growth,” said Maria Teresa Kumar, CEO of Voto Latino. a group. maps, he said in a statement at the end of last month.

“The efforts of the Texas GOP are silencing the voices of Latinos, diminishing the power of the vote, gathering and dividing them into crooked constituency lines that reduce their representation, and making it more difficult for them to elect elected representatives,” Kumar said.