Help End Prison Gerrymandering Prison gerrymandering funnels political power away from urban communities to legislators who have prisons in their (often white, rural) districts. More than two decades ago, the Prison Policy Initiative put numbers on the problem and sparked the movement to end prison gerrymandering.

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ACLU files lawsuit challenging “prison gerrymandering” election districts in Florida county

by Bernadette Rabuy, March 11, 2015

On Monday, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Florida filed a federal lawsuit challenging an election system in Jefferson County, Florida, which counts the state prison population in the drawing of district maps. The complaint argues that the 2013 Redistricting Plan violates the “one person, one vote” standard of the 14th Amendment.

For more information, read the ACLU’s press release. And check out the Florida page of our 2010 report to learn more about the negative impact of prison gerrymandering in Florida, on both the local and state levels.

Related briefings:

  1. ACLU opposes prison gerrymandering in Florida’s school boards +
  2. Reading, Writing, and Redistricting in School Board Districts with Prisons Part II: Florida +
  3. Fear of “unwieldy” rural districts in Florida should not have led to dilution of one person one vote principle +

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