WKNO TRANSCRIPT
GLORIA JOHNSON: "This is not a special session. This is a white power rally and a white power grab."
CHRISTOPHER BLANK: That was Democrat Gloria Johnson on Thursday as Tennessee Republicans divided Shelby County into three separate congressional districts. With us to talk about the impact is political analyst Otis Sanford. Welcome back.
OTIS SANFORD: Thank you for having me, Chris.
BLANK: This came about because a recent Supreme Court ruling allows states to divide up formerly Black voting blocs on a new basis, and that basis is party affiliation. Republicans say Memphis is not a black city, it's a Democrat city. Otis, were you heartened to hear state leaders say that these maps were drawn without any racial bias?
SANFORD: Anyone who believes that I have some swamp land in the bayou of Mississippi to sell you at a top price. Gloria Johnson is right on point here. I think people can look at this and see what it is. It is a white power grab.
BLANK: Sen. Jeff Yarbro, a Nashville Democrat, pointed out that most of white Northeast Shelby County has been placed into a fairly compact area with other white people, while Black Memphis was cut essentially in half and then apportioned into what are now the two most sprawling districts in the state of Tennessee. This is presumably because Republicans had to travel many miles to get enough white people to outnumber the Blacks. And again, Republicans say race was not a factor here, but here is Sen. Yarbro:
JEFF YARBRO: It's an insult to the intelligence of the people in this room and an insult to the intelligence of the people in this state to claim that there is no way, that there was no knowledge or awareness of the racial impact that I just said.
BLANK: Otis, even if the goal here is to disenfranchise Democrats, do these maps make logical sense for the needs of these new urban-slash-rural constituencies?
SANFORD: It makes no sense at all. You're talking about a district that will now go from deep into Memphis --African-American areas -- all the way out toward Chattanooga, and then And another one that curves around to touch Williamson County on the northern end of the state. This is unbelievable that they would go to such lengths to get as many white people in a district to outnumber the number of Black people that they had to include-- because we have to be counted and included -- But it's done in such a way that they expect Black voters will be outnumbered by conservative, Republican white voters. That's the whole reason here and it is completely discriminatory against Memphis and African-Americans in Memphis.
BLANK: Republicans say, "we didn't even look at race. We didn't we didn't even consider it. We didn't even look at the statistics. We didn't look at anything like that." Why do you find that argument disingenuous?
OTIS: Well, because I know who I'm dealing with here. Memphis is a city that's 64% maybe 65% African American. The ninth congressional district was made up of 61% of African-Americans. Last time I checked, that's an overwhelming majority on both ends. So, you cannot say with a straight face that you had no idea that Black people would be impacted by this and this was not your intent. It's a story that they've been working on for the last couple of days. It's a script that they've been using to say, "say it's partisan politically, but don't say it's racial. Don't even bring up race because we think we might be safe in doing that."
BLANK: And what do you mean by safe? I think you're referring to potential lawsuits that could come of this.
SANFORD: I am. And lawsuits are already being filed from what I'm hearing. There's a possibility this could be halted and it not affect the August election or this November election, and we'll see where it goes from there.
BLANK: Well, right on the heels of passing these new maps, State Sen. Brent Taylor announced that he will be running for Congress in the new ninth district. Republicans would say, "Well, he's got Memphis covered. Black people in Memphis would be able to vote for Brent Taylor." Would he be a good person for Memphis?
SANFORD: The issue here is Taylor had this mantra about "Making Memphis Matter." But the fact is it's all been about Making Brent Matter. The fact that he announced even before the bill was signed into law tells us what his overall motive was. Taylor has used up all the capital-- if he ever had any recently --out of Memphis and Memphians by going along with this underhanded devious move. And frankly, I think he's going to get his votes from the rural, very conservative areas of Tennessee, again because I think people in Memphis will say -- and they have been telling me this over the last day or two -- that Brent Taylor has sold out Memphis.
