Race wasn't only factor in Detroit map drawing, redistricting commissioner testifies

Kalamazoo — A Detroit-area redistricting commissioner told judges Friday that the commission's Metro Detroit maps were not driven by race, but by "multifactorial" efforts to balance population, keep communities of interest together and achieve partisan fairness.

Part of the reason majority-Black Detroit districts were drawn across Eight Mile and into predominantly White suburbs in Oakland and Macomb counties was to follow recent population shifts north and undo past redlining that segregated Detroit from the suburbs, said Anthony Eid, a member of the Michigan Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission.

There were no racial targets the commission was trying to achieve, he argued.

Eid's testimony contradicted a few of his fellow map-drawers who told a three-judge panel earlier this week that race and an effort to lower the concentration of Black voter in Detroit-based districts were the driving factor in how the commission drew district boundaries for the Michigan Legislature.

"There were multiple competing interests at multiple points in this process," Eid said.

Eid's testimony came on the third day of a federal bench trial to decide whether redistricting commissioners illegally diluted the Black vote in Detroit House and Senate districts by fracturing the city into multiple spoke-like districts that reached into White suburbs in Oakland and Macomb counties.

Several Detroiters filed the suit in March 2022, arguing that race drove the drawing of the districts — in violation of the 14th Amendment — and that Black voting numbers were so diluted that it made it impossible for Black voters to have a chance to elect a preferred candidate. When there's evidence of racially polarized voting — as there is in Detroit — the Voting Rights Act requires legislative districts be drawn so as to give African American voters a demonstrable chance at electing a preferred candidate.

The trial, which is expected to resume Monday, is being held in Kalamazoo in front of federal judges Raymond Kethledge, Paul Maloney and Janet Neff.

The trial is one of the strongest tests to date of the new maps drawn by the Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission, a redistricting process adopted by Michigan voters in 2018. The group of 13 citizen commissioners finished drawing the maps in December 2021, taking over the responsibility from the legislative majority usually tasked with the redistricting.

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More:'100% about race': Trial examines legislative maps' impact on Black Detroit voters

On Wednesday, at least three redistricting commissioners said they felt pressured by their hired consultants and legal counsel to lower the Black voting age concentrations in Metro Detroit districts to between 35% and 40%. In past maps, the concentration had been as high as 90% and, consultants argued, was evidence of packing that had to be undone.

"Cracking" and "packing" are terms used to describe a form of gerrymandering barred by the Voting Rights Act. Packing involves squeezing as many people of a certain demographic or political belief into as few districts as possible to decrease the number of seats they can win in the Legislature. At the other end of the gerrymander spectrum, cracking involves splitting certain populations up into as many districts as possible to dilute their influence in any legislative election.

Commissioner Rebecca Szetela on Wednesday said the pressure to undo past packing was so great, the drawing process became "100% about race" and pushed commissioners to the other extreme of cracking.

An expert Thursday said his analysis determined the districts could only have taken on the shape and stretch they did if race and an effort to lower Black voting concentrations were guiding the hand of map drawers. Political analyst Sean Trende of RealClearPolitics referred to them as "bacon-mandered" because of the long curvy shape of districts and said one district, Senate District 8, diluted the Black vote so much that the results resemble "Alabama in the 1960s."

The commission's attorneys have argued their focus was not on race, but on partisan fairness; specifically, ensuring that the party with the most votes gets the most number of seats in the Legislature. To achieve that partisan fairness in the overall map, the districts were divided into multiple strips that stretched into the suburbs and provided southeast Michigan with additional reliably Democratic districts.

Bruce Adelson, the group's Voting Rights Act consultant who is expected to continue testifying Monday, said commissioners were informally focusing on the partisan effects of district redrawing from early in the process. But the only proper partisan fairness measure can be done on a statewide completed map, he said.

Adelson also argued there wasn't a certain percentage the group was aiming for but noted the commissioners, understandably, were pushing for him to provide a benchmark so they would have a better framework for how the districts are drawn. He said other redistricting groups he's worked with have asked for the same, but to give them a target number would be illegal.

"I know the nuance was a struggle," Adelson said. "They wanted those numbers. They're not unique in that way."

In his Friday testimony, Eid went through each of the 13 House and Senate districts on trial, explaining communities of interest, population concerns and efforts to undo redlining that supposedly guided those lines.

Eid said complaints from Detroiters about the maps were not focused on the criteria the commission was tasked with following. He said he believed the protests were part of an organized effort to call the maps into question.

"What many folks wanted at that meeting was not supported by the data," Eid said.

On cross-examination, the plaintiff's lawyers asked Eid about his involvement with a redistricting Reddit page, his brief hire by a non-profit that lobbied the commission and his expulsion from Wayne State University Medical School for dishonesty.

Eid has argued he wasn't dishonest, but was pressured into signing a letter admitting to dishonesty by university staff handling his case. He unsuccessfully sued the university to reverse the decision in Michigan's Eastern U.S. District Court and unsuccessfully appealed to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In court Friday, Eid denied being dishonest at Wayne State or in any testimony Friday. He noted that Michigan chose to select random citizens to serve on the commission, even those who'd made mistakes.

"Citizens aren't perfect," Eid said.

Jennifer Green, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, challenged Eid's assertion that there were not racial targets the group was trying to achieve, noting the 35% to 40% range was referred to in meetings as a "target," "benchmark," "guidepost" and numbers and percentages the group was trying to hit.

"It's not a target," Eid insisted repeatedly.

Former state Rep. Sherry Gay-Dagnogo, a Black Detroit Democrat and plaintiff in the case, responded to Eid from the back of the courtroom.

"Then what the hell is it?" she asked.

eleblanc@detroitnews.com