IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 13-20491

EDWARD GONZALEZ; ORNALDO YBARRA; PATRICIA GONZALES; 

THOMAS BERG; REYNALDO GUERRA; SANDRA PUENTE, 

 Plaintiffs - Appellants Cross-Appellees

v.

HARRIS COUNTY, TEXAS; ED EMMETT, 

 Defendants - Appellees Cross-Appellants

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Texas

USDC No. 4:11-CV-2907 

Before STEWART, Chief Judge, and BARKSDALE and GRAVES, Circuit 

Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

Regarding their proposed Latino-opportunity voting district, Latino 

citizens of Harris County, Texas, claim the county violated § 2 of the Voting 

Rights Act of 1965, 52 U.S.C. § 10301 (previously codified at 42 U.S.C. § 1973). 

Primarily at issue is whether the district court erred in concluding plaintiffs 

* Pursuant to 5th Cir. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not 

be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5th Cir. 

R. 47.5.4.

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

February 9, 2015

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

 

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failed to propose a hypothetical district in which the Latino voting-age 

population was sufficiently compact, a precondition to their § 2 claim, based on 

the proposed district’s not sufficiently comporting with traditional districting 

principles. Rodriguez v. Harris Cnty., Tex., 964 F. Supp. 2d 686, 753 (S.D. Tex. 

2013); see, e.g., Thornburg v. Gingles, 478 U.S. 30, 50 (1986). Essentially for 

the reasons stated by the district court regarding that compactness 

precondition, the judgment is AFFIRMED.

I.

With over four million residents, Harris County is the third-largest 

county by population in the United States. The county is governed by a 

commissioners court, comprised of four commissioners elected from four singlemember precincts, and a county judge, elected at-large. Of the over fourmillion county residents, approximately two million live in the city of Houston. 

Each of the four precincts includes part of Houston. 

Precinct 1 became an African-American-opportunity voting district in 

1980 (the boundaries of the precinct were drawn to facilitate election of an 

African-American-preferred candidate). Precinct 2 has a substantial Latino 

population; in his testimony in this action, the county’s principal expert 

referred to it as “an influence district for Hispanics”. 

This action concerns a vote-dilution dispute that arose following the 2010 

census. Pursuant to that census, the county’s population in 2010 was 40.8 

percent Latino, 33.0 percent Caucasian, 18.4 percent African-American, and 

7.7 percent Asian-American or “other”. In contrast, in 2000, the population 

was 42.1 percent Caucasian, 32.9 percent Latino, 18.2 percent AfricanAmerican, and 6.8 percent Asian-American or “other”. In short, between 2000 

and 2010, the population shift essentially involved Latinos and Caucasians; 

the Latino population increased, while the Caucasian population declined. 

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In August 2011, in the light of the population change between 2000 and 

2010, the county adopted a voter-redistricting plan, reshaping its precincts’

boundaries, which will be in effect until after the 2020 census. As part of that 

process, the commissioners court adopted several districting principles for 

those precincts: population equality; contiguity and reasonable geographic 

compactness; use of identifiable geographic boundaries as precinct boundaries; 

preservation of natural historical boundaries; avoiding splitting neighborhoods 

and communities of interest; basing the precincts on the existing composition; 

using whole county voting precincts to draw commissioner precincts; following 

constitutional and statutory directives; not diluting voting strength of racial or 

language minority citizens; not fragmenting minority communities or 

concentrating them in a manner greater than necessary to help them elect 

minority representation; recognizing incumbent-constituency relationships; 

keeping existing commissioners in their existing precincts; keeping facilities 

and service locations established by incumbent commissioners in the precincts 

of those commissioners; and recognizing commissioners’ obligations imposed 

by law to provide services to the residents of their precincts. 

That same month, this action by Latino citizens challenged the adopted 

plan as violating § 2, contending it diluted Latino votes. Plaintiffs also claimed, 

inter alia: the plan violated § 5 of the Voting Rights Act (preclearance 

requirement), the Equal Protection Clause, the First and Fourteenth 

Amendments, and Article I of the Constitution; and the county should be

enjoined from enforcing the adopted plan and claimed unlawful voter 

registration practices. The League of United Latin American Citizens and a 

group of African-American citizen residents of the county intervened. 

Regarding the numerous proceedings for this action, such as the district court’s 

plan being used for the 2012 elections, the only issue raised by plaintiffs in this 

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appeal is whether the county’s adopted plan comports with § 2 of the Voting 

Rights Act. 

In a four-day bench trial in November 2012, the court considered

testimony from fact and expert witnesses and, among other exhibits,

hypothetical, illustrative redistricting maps plaintiffs presented to 

demonstrate, inter alia, the compactness of the Latino voting-age citizenry. 

Compactness is the first of three preconditions to analyzing whether, based on 

a totality of the circumstances, Latinos are entitled to § 2 relief. E.g., Gingles, 

478 U.S. at 50; Rodriguez v. Bexar Cnty., Tex., 385 F.3d 853, 859 (5th Cir. 

2004). Regarding § 2, plaintiffs challenge only the court’s conclusion and 

corresponding findings of fact for the first precondition; they prevailed on the 

second and third preconditions, 964 F. Supp. 2d at 756, 777, as well as on the 

“totality of the circumstances” assessment, id. at 797, 800. 

The court’s 1 August 2013, 158-page opinion contains exhaustive 

findings of fact and conclusions of law, including extremely detailed charts, 

statistics, and analyses of testimony and other evidence. Based on the 2010 

census, the court found, inter alia, precincts 1 and 2 were “well below the ideal 

population mean” under the one-man, one-vote principle, which required 

redistricting. Id. at 712. For the first precondition (numerosity and 

compactness), the court ruled: plaintiffs presented a geographically compact 

hypothetical district with a greater-than-50-percent Latino voting-age 

“minority” population; but, nevertheless, failed to satisfy the compactness 

precondition because their plans did not respect traditional districting 

principles. Id. at 739, 741, 753-54. (The Voting Rights Act defines a “minority” 

as “a member of a protected class of racial and language minorities”. Gingles, 

478 U.S. at 43 (interpreting the Voting Rights Act, 52 U.S.C. § 10301).) In that 

regard, it found plaintiffs’ maps failed to respect those principles because, inter 

alia, they adversely impacted the commissioners’ ability to deliver services to 

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their constituents; shifted approximately 40 percent of the county’s population 

to a new precinct, thereby disrupting incumbent-constituency relationships;

split two cities (Baytown and Pasadena) between two precincts; and threatened 

the existing African-American voting-opportunity precinct in the county. 964 

F. Supp. 2d at 753-54. 

II.

Plaintiffs claim: Latinos comprise a substantial population of the 

county, but the county’s adopted voter-redistricting plan fails to create a 

precinct in which Latinos may elect a candidate of their choice; therefore, the 

plan violates § 2 of the Voting Rights Act. (Because the judgment is affirmed 

for plaintiffs’ failure to satisfy the compactness precondition, we need not 

consider the county’s conditional cross-appeal or its corresponding motion to 

take judicial notice of certain related election results.) 

Section 2 prohibits any “voting qualification or prerequisite to voting or 

standard, practice, or procedure . . . which results in a denial or abridgement 

of the right of any citizen of the United States to vote on account of race or 

color . . . ”. 52 U.S.C. § 10301(a). A § 2 violation “is established if, based on the 

totality of circumstances, it is shown that the political processes leading to 

nomination or election in the State or political subdivision are not equally open 

to participation by members of a class of citizens protected by [this statute]”. 

Id. § 10301(b).

The Supreme Court’s decision in 1986 in Gingles, 478 U.S. 30, provides 

the two-part framework for analyzing § 2 claims. To succeed, plaintiffs must 

first satisfy three preconditions: “(1) [the minority group must be] sufficiently 

large and geographically compact to constitute a majority in a single-member 

district; (2) it [must be] politically cohesive; and (3) the white majority [(as 

noted, the Caucasian population is not a majority in Harris County)] [must] 

vote[] sufficiently as a bloc to enable it—in the absence of special 

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circumstances—usually to defeat the minority’s preferred candidates”. Sensley 

v. Albritton, 385 F.3d 591, 595 (5th Cir. 2004) (quoting Clark v. Calhoun Cnty., 

Miss., 21 F.3d 92, 94-95 (5th Cir. 1994)). “Failure to establish all three of these 

elements defeats a Section 2 claim.” Id. (citing Teague v. Attala Cnty., Miss., 

92 F.3d 283, 287 (5th Cir. 1996)). “Second, if the [three] preconditions are 

proved, plaintiffs must then prove that, ‘based on the totality of the 

circumstances,’ they ‘have less opportunity than other members of the 

electorate to participate in the political process and to elect representatives of 

their choice.’” Id. (quoting Clark, 21 F.3d at 94).

Satisfying the first Gingles precondition–compactness–normally

requires submitting as evidence hypothetical redistricting schemes in the form 

of illustrative plans. E.g., Fairley v. Hattiesburg, Miss., 584 F.3d 660, 669 (5th

Cir. 2009). In assessing these plans, the issue is not whether plaintiffs’ plan is 

“oddly shaped, but whether the proposal demonstrate[s] that a geographically 

compact district could be drawn”. Houston v. Lafayette Cnty., Miss., 56 F.3d 

606, 611 (5th Cir. 1995) (emphasis omitted). The proposed plan must also 

encompass a district with a greater-than-50-percent voting-age minority

population. Bartlett v. Strickland, 556 U.S. 1, 19-20 (2009); Westwego Citizens 

for Better Gov’t v. City of Westwego, 946 F.2d 1109, 1117 n.7 (5th Cir. 1991)

(Westwego II). (As noted, a “minority” under the Voting Rights Act is a member 

of a racial or language minority group, 52 U.S.C. § 10301; see also 52 U.S.C. 

§ 10303(f)(2).) Furthermore, under Gingles, compactness requires accounting 

for “traditional districting principles such as maintaining communities of 

interest and traditional boundaries”. League of United Latin Am. Citizens v. 

Perry, 548 U.S. 399, 433 (2006) (internal quotation marks omitted) (quoting

Abrams v. Johnson, 521 U.S. 74, 91 (1997)).

As stated, the court found: plaintiffs presented a geographically compact 

hypothetical district with a greater-than-50-percent voting-age “minority”

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population; but, they failed to satisfy the compactness precondition because 

their plans did not respect traditional districting principles. Rodriguez, 964 F. 

Supp. 2d at 753-54. Therefore, their claim necessarily failed. E.g., Sensley, 

385 F.3d at 595, 598. 

Plaintiffs contend the court committed reversible error on two grounds: 

traditional districting principles must not be considered in assessing 

compactness; but, if they must be considered, the court afforded excessive 

deference to those principles relative to its finding the proposed plans were 

geographically compact and contained a greater-than-fifty-percent Latino, 

voting-age population, committing errors of law and making clearly erroneous 

findings of fact in the process. “This court reviews de novo the legal standards 

the district court applied to determine whether Section 2 has been violated.” 

Id. at 595 (citation omitted). Review of the findings of fact related to the 

Gingles preconditions and vote dilution is for clear error. Id. (citation omitted). 

“A finding is clearly erroneous when although there is evidence to support it, 

the reviewing court on the entire evidence is left with the definite and firm 

conviction that a mistake has been made.” Id. (alteration, citation, and 

internal quotation marks omitted).

A.

Plaintiffs’ challenge to the use of traditional districting principles in 

ruling on compactness fails; those principles must be considered when 

analyzing that aspect of the first Gingles precondition. Perry, 548 U.S. at 433 

(A § 2 compactness “inquiry should take into account traditional districting 

principles such as maintaining communities of interest and traditional 

boundaries” because “[t]he recognition of nonracial communities of interest 

reflects the principle that a State may not assume from a group of voters’ race 

that they think alike, share the same political interests, and will prefer the 

same candidates at the polls” (alteration, citations, and internal quotation 

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marks omitted) (quoting Miller v. Johnson, 515 U.S. 900, 920 (1995)); Abrams, 

521 U.S. at 92 (“[T]he § 2 compactness inquiry should take into account 

traditional districting principles . . . ”.); Fairley, 584 F.3d at 670 (In assessing 

compactness, “[c]ourts are expected . . . to take into account traditional 

districting principles . . . ”. (citations and internal quotation marks omitted)). 

B.

Plaintiffs next assert the court, in concluding they failed to satisfy the 

compactness precondition, committed an error of law and made clearly 

erroneous findings of fact by affording excessive deference to traditional 

districting principles. “[N]o precise rule has emerged governing § 2 

compactness” analysis. Perry, 548 U.S. at 433 (citation omitted). 

Such principles include, inter alia: compactness, contiguity, and respect 

for political subdivisions, e.g., Shaw v. Reno, 509 U.S. 630, 647 (1993); avoiding 

contests between incumbent representatives, e.g., Karcher v. Daggett, 462 U.S. 

725, 740 (1983); not disrupting preexisting electoral minority-opportunity 

districts, e.g., Abrams, 521 U.S. at 94; Sensley, 385 F.3d at 598; and 

maintaining communities of interest and traditional boundaries, e.g., Perry, 

548 U.S. at 433. “[T]he party attacking the . . . boundaries [drawn by the 

political subdivision] must show at the least that [it] could have achieved its 

legitimate political objectives in alternative ways that are comparably 

consistent with traditional districting principles”. Easley v. Cromartie, 532

U.S. 234, 258 (2001) (emphasis added). 

In Vieth v. Jubelirer, the Court eschewed as “unguided and ill suited to 

the development of judicial standards” both a formulaic approach to assessing 

traditional districting principles and an individualized method by which to 

account for them. 541 U.S. 267, 296 (2004) (plurality) (“How much disregard 

of traditional districting principles [is necessary to find compactness lacking]? 

. . . What is a lower court to do when . . . the district adheres to some traditional 

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criteria but not others? . . . [T]he devil lurks precisely in such detail”. (emphasis 

omitted)); id. at 308 (Kennedy, J., concurring in the judgment) (“The plurality 

demonstrates the shortcomings of . . . standards that have been considered to 

date . . . by our dissenting colleagues [which] are either unmanageable or 

inconsistent with precedent, or both.”). Although Vieth concerned justiciability 

of political-gerrymandering matters, id. at 306, its assessment of traditional 

districting principles in the light of Gingles’ compactness precondition is highly

informative. 

As noted, Easley instructs that plaintiffs have the burden of 

demonstrating “alternative [illustrative plans] that are comparably consistent 

with traditional districting principles”. 532 U.S. at 258. Therefore, in 

assessing compactness, courts must account for traditional districting 

principles; the burden is on plaintiffs to present an illustrative plan adhering 

to comparably consistent principles–not necessarily principles identical, or 

subjugated, to a locality’s exact prioritization, but simply those within the 

confines of a “well-developed, legally-adequate plan that can be adjusted” at 

the remedial stage. Fairley, 584 F.3d at 671 n.14. 

“Section 2 vote dilution disputes are determinations peculiarly 

dependent upon the facts of each case that require an intensely local appraisal 

of the design and impact of the contested electoral mechanism”. Sensley, 385 

F.3d at 595 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). In that regard, 

district courts have “particular familiarity with the indigenous political 

reality”, id. (citation and quotation marks omitted); and we “owe deference to 

[them] on [compactness] findings”, id. at 597. (For this action, the courthouse 

for the Houston Division of the Southern District of Texas is located in 

Houston, in Harris County.) Of course, such deference does not alter de novo 

review of legal challenges, id. at 595, but it does concern clear-error review of

a factual finding to the extent it relies on an “intensely local appraisal of the 

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design and impact of the contested electoral mechanisms”, id., which only a 

district court is in a position to make. E.g., Rodriguez, 964 F. Supp. 2d at 746-

53 (exemplifying district court’s assessment of intensely local considerations). 

For example, maintaining traditional boundaries is a recognized traditional 

districting principle, and a locality may rely, inter alia, on this principle in 

drawing its boundaries. Perry, 548 U.S. at 433. But if a shift in population or 

some other intervening factor renders the importance of maintaining such 

boundaries marginal, a district court may find this particular principle 

unpersuasive in the compactness assessment. See Sensley, 385 F.3d at 595. 

Therefore, when a locality adopts a redistricting plan according to 

certain traditional districting principles, as the county did in this instance, the 

district court must consider all such principles relied on by the locality, any 

opposition to such reliance by § 2 plaintiffs, and any traditional districting 

principles which § 2 plaintiffs may incorporate into their hypothetical plan in 

an effort to demonstrate comparable consistency with the plan. See Easley, 

532 U.S. at 258. The district court may find, furthermore, that the locality’s 

preferred districting principles: are pretext for discrimination; insufficient to 

trump a finding of geographic compactness; or subordinate to the overall goal 

of § 2 of preventing “political processes . . . [which] are not equally open to 

participation by members of a class of citizens protected”, 52 U.S.C. § 10301(b);

or, conversely, justify the adopted redistricting plan and the minority group’s 

proposed plan fails to comparably account for them. 

1.

Consistent with this, in its analysis of the compactness precondition, the 

court addressed plaintiffs’ concerns about affording undue deference to the

county’s preferred districting principles, stating: “[I]t would be unfair to 

require Plaintiffs to draw maps in strict accordance with the County’s 

priorities. Under [such a] scheme, the entire Section 2 analysis is infected by 

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which traditional redistricting principles the County has prioritized, thereby 

precluding any meaningful review . . . ”. 964 F. Supp. 2d at 745. 

In that regard, the court reasoned that interpreting § 2 to require courts 

to assess the locality’s preferred districting principles “conflates the liability 

analysis with the remedy analysis”. Id. “Under this scheme”, the court held, 

“the ultimate viability and effectiveness of a remedy is considered at the 

remedial stage of litigation and not during analysis of the Gingles

preconditions”. Id. (citation omitted). Furthermore, consistent with Vieth, the 

district court discarded as impractical the rigid, formulaic approach to 

assessing traditional districting principles. The court ruled that, instead:

“Plaintiffs need only show a ‘well-developed, legally-adequate plan that can be 

adjusted during the remedial stage’”. Id. at 746 (alterations omitted) (quoting 

Fairley, 584 F.3d at 671 n.14). The court’s analysis conforms with the requisite 

approach, as discussed supra.

2.

For plaintiffs’ seven proposed redistricting plans, the court concluded all 

but two failed to “give rise to a claim of vote dilution”. Id. at 733-37. After 

reviewing the remaining two proposed plans (Korbel 257 and Korbel 325, 

named for the creator of the plans, who testified as plaintiffs’ principal expert 

witness) and hearing testimony about them, the court found the plans’ “shapes 

are not so bizarre or irregular as to render them objectionable. . . . The Court 

thus finds that Plaintiffs’ Korbel 257 and Korbel 325 are compactly shaped”. 

Id. at 739. 

It nevertheless concluded plaintiffs’ plans failed to adhere to traditional 

districting principles, namely, preserving incumbent-constituency 

relationships and communities of interest/traditional boundaries, and 

preservation of an effective (the African-American) minority-opportunity 

precinct. Id. at 753-54. In reaching that conclusion, the court: assessed the 

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Korbel plans’ impact on incumbent-constituency relationships, comparing how 

these plans proposed shifting almost 40 percent of the county-wide voting-age 

population, versus only a nine-percent shift in the county’s adopted plan; 

considered the plans’ effect on county assets, noting the substantial number of, 

inter alia, park acreage, square miles, and road miles that would be 

reallocated; factored in the substantial impact on precinct 1 (the AfricanAmerican opportunity precinct) and the important facilities that would fall 

outside of its boundaries under the Korbel plans; and found those plans would 

make coordination of county-service delivery far more difficult. 

a.

The court found that “a sizeable faction of the [county’s] population lives 

in unincorporated areas—i.e., territory within the bounds of Harris County 

that is not within the boundaries of a municipality”, with approximately 39

percent of residents (1.6 million) residing in the unincorporated part of the 

county in 2010. Id. at 716. In that regard, the court found, as urged by the 

county, that plaintiffs’ proposed plans would result in a significant shift 

between precincts of the assets used to provide services to the unincorporated 

areas. Id. at 753-54. It found: “[o]n the whole, . . . the movement of the assets 

as contemplated by Plaintiffs’ proposed [plans] would be extremely disruptive”,

id. at 751; and, similarly, those plans “would adversely impact the 

commissioners’ ability to deliver services to their constituents”, id. at 753. 

In urging error, plaintiffs cite Westwego Citizens for Better Government 

v. City of Westwego (Westwego I), in which our court relied on an eleventh 

circuit decision that stated: “Nowhere in the language of Section 2 nor in the 

legislative history does Congress condition the applicability of Section 2 on the 

function performed by an elected official”. 872 F.2d 1201, 1210 (5th Cir. 1989)

(alteration omitted) (quoting Dillard v. Crenshaw Cnty., 831 F.2d 246, 250–51 

(11th Cir. 1986)). Westwego I held: “Congress did not contemplate that such 

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considerations would play a role in determining whether there has been a 

violation of section 2”. Id. at 1211 (emphasis omitted).

The county responds that, in Sensley, our court, for compactness vel non,

considered disruption of incumbent-constituent relationships. Sensley

provides our court owes deference to the district court’s finding of fact that the 

shape of a district was not “compact” because the proposed plan, inter alia, 

“disrupted relationships between incumbents and constituents”. 385 F.3d at 

597. 

Sensley is not in tension with Westwego I, which referenced the 

“function[s] performed by an elected official”. Westwego I, 872 F.2d at 1210. 

Here, in its findings about the movement of assets between precincts under 

plaintiffs’ plans, the court did not consider improperly the functions performed 

by an elected official. Instead, its findings concerned the ability to provide 

required services. 

b.

Along that line, regarding preservation of communities of interest, the 

court found the Korbel plans split two cities, and that one plan relocated two 

commissioners in the same precinct and moved two commissioners out of their 

precincts. Plaintiffs assert the court “observed” a split would occur but failed 

to “explain whether these splits led to a finding of non-compactness”. Plaintiffs 

maintain the court misapplied governing law because splitting two cities is 

acceptable “if the overall shape of the demonstrative” precinct “is compact”. 

Traditional boundaries, however, are appropriate factors to consider in 

compactness analysis. Perry, 548 U.S. at 433.

The court considered the splitting of two cities in the context of 

maintaining both traditional boundaries and continuity in delivery of 

constituent services. On the other hand, the county’s adopted plan splits one 

city, and several designated census locations and voter tabulation districts. 

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Therefore, with respect to the principle that redistricting plans should avoid 

splitting cities, the plaintiffs’ proposed, and the county’s adopted, plans are 

“comparably consistent”. Easley, 532 U.S. at 258. 

c.

As the district court found, Korbel 257 relocated two commissioners 

within the same district, which violates the traditional districting principle of 

avoiding contests between incumbents. Karcher, 462 U.S. at 740. Further, 

Korbel 325 failed to satisfy the compactness precondition because, according to 

the district court’s finding, and as discussed infra, it “does not comport well 

with Precinct 1’s status as a performing [minority-]opportunity district”. 964 

F. Supp. 2d at 748. Last, the court found both of plaintiffs’ plans contemplate 

“shifting almost two-fifths of the county-wide voting age population”, in 

contrast to the approximate nine-percent shift in the county’s adopted plan. 

Id. at 749. This weighs heavily in favor of finding plaintiffs failed to accord 

due deference to traditional districting principles, because, as stated, respect 

for traditional boundaries is one such principle. Perry, 548 U.S. at 433. 

d.

The court next assessed the preservation of precinct 1 as an effective 

minority-opportunity district, a recognized traditional districting principle, 

e.g., Abrams, 521 U.S. at 94; Sensley, 385 F.3d at 598, which plaintiffs do not 

claim may not be considered in the compactness analysis. It found fault in 

plaintiffs’ plans for failing to include a “sizeable home-owning AfricanAmerican population in the Bush Airport area” in precinct 1. 964 F. Supp. 2d 

at 751. Plaintiffs contend their plans compensated for removing this area from 

precinct 1 by replacing it with “a sizeable African-American population” in the 

Alief community. The district court, based in part on plaintiffs’ principal 

expert’s testimony (Korbel), found this insufficient because the AfricanAmericans living in Alief reside primarily in apartments. 

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In that regard, relying on the testimony of one of plaintiffs’ witnesses, a 

Latina state senator, who had been elected as the commissioner for precinct 2 

in 2002 but was defeated by a Republican candidate in 2010, the court found:

apartment-dwellers are more transient; and, therefore, replacing homedwellers with apartment-dwellers was insufficient to compensate for removal 

of the home-dwellers from precinct 1. It found plaintiffs’ plans would “threaten 

the continued existence of [that precinct] as an opportunity district”. Id. at 

753. This finding was not clearly erroneous.

Last, contrary to plaintiffs’ assertion, the district court’s evaluation of 

the proposed plans was not speculative. It found, inter alia, “the AfricanAmerican community is retracting on the edges of the Latino community”. Id. 

at 751 (emphasis added). Plaintiffs’ expert “noticed a pattern . . . [where] the 

black population decreases and the Latino population in the census tract 

increases . . . ”. Id. (emphasis added). Finally, the district court found: “The 

Alief area, which Mr. Korbel has included in Precinct 1, is in the middle of this 

demographic lifecycle.” Id. (emphasis added). Accordingly, the district court 

did not make a clearly erroneous finding of fact. 

e.

In sum, the district court thoroughly considered traditional districting 

principles and balanced them appropriately against its first finding that the 

proposed plans included a geographically compact voting-age “minority”

district. Therefore, and essentially for the reasons stated in its extremely 

comprehensive opinion, the court did not commit reversible error in concluding 

plaintiffs’ proposed plans were not “compact” under Gingles’ first precondition. 

III.

For the foregoing reasons, the judgment is AFFIRMED. 

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