April 3 Primary in Doubt

"If we have no agreed set of maps by February 6, 2012, there will be no April 3 primary." That was the stark warning on Jan. 27 from the San Antonio judicial panel to Texans in the ongoing redistricting trial. The panel's instructions were simple: The coalition of minority voting rights groups challenging the Legislature's most recent gerrymandering had 10 days to come to an interim redistricting agreement with the state; otherwise, the court will take charge of the process again, further delaying primary season. The challenge for the plaintiffs is to maintain a unified front, amid rumors over the weekend that the Mexican American Legislative Caucus and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund were negotiating with the state to secure Hispanic opportunity districts without consideration for other minority groups. However, on Monday afternoon, League of United Latin American Citizens attorney Luis Vera Jr. told the Chronicle that all negotiations had "totally broken down" and that all the plaintiffs remained committed to waiting for the result of the federal preclearance trial. Since Washington, D.C., district judges only heard closing arguments in that case on Jan. 30, the Feb. 6 deadline seems unlikely, if not impossible.