FREEPORT, N.Y. — Weihua Yan had experienced dramatic demographic changes since moving to Nassau County on Long Island.
The Asian American population alone had grown by 60% since the 2010 census. Why, he wondered, did he see no one who looked like him in the county’s local governing body, the 19-member Nassau County Legislature?
Last year he decided to do something about it and ran for one of the seats. He assembled a campaign team that knocked on 10,000 people and developed what they thought was a solid strategy – aimed at their potential base: white Democrats and people of color, especially Asian voters.
The strategy increased voter turnout, but did not help Yan win. His bid to become the first Asian American on the county’s governing body failed, and he thinks he knows why.
Minority residents and voter advocates blame a redistricting process overseen by the county Legislature, which has a Republican majority. They say the province’s political map drawn up after the 2020 census was primarily intended to preserve the existing power structure, thereby preventing minority voters from electing a government more representative of the area’s growing diversity.
The province is now facing a lawsuit over those maps. Four Latino residents and a local civil rights organization sued the Legislature earlier this year, claiming it manipulated the map-making process to weaken the influence of the county’s Black, Latino and Asian communities. Whites make up just 56% of the county’s nearly 1.4 million residents, but make up nearly 80% of the governing body.
Yan is not part of the lawsuit, but says he supports its purpose.
“When I look at Nassau County, there has been an increase in the population of Asian communities since I moved here 16 years ago,” he said. “However, there was not a single elected office in Nassau County held by Asian Americans. So for me, we really need to make sure that we have our own real representation.”
The action against Nassau County is one of at least four lawsuits filed under New York’s Voting Rights Act, which took effect two years ago. New York is one of at least seven largely Democratic-controlled states that have taken action to protect voting rights after lawmakers grew frustrated with the flood of new voting restrictions in many Republican-led states following the 2020 election and the failure of the voting rights legislation in Congress.
The lawsuits, including suits against Mount Pleasant, Cheektowaga and Newburgh, help debunk the long-standing narrative that racial discrimination only occurs in the South or in deeply Republican states.
“New York is not immune to racial inequality and racial vote dilution simply because it tends to vote in a more progressive manner than southern states,” said Perry Grossman, voting rights director at the New York Civil Liberties Union who helped lead the write the new state law.
Under the federal Voting Rights Act, some states and local governments were required to obtain prior approval from the U.S. Department of Justice before making voting-related changes because of their history of discrimination. The practice, known as preclearance, was effectively ended by a 2013 Supreme Court ruling.
Although Nassau County was not subject to the preclearance provision, the county had a history of racial segregation since the early 20th century, especially in housing and policing, the lawsuit said. The Ku Klux Klan held rallies and burned crosses in Nassau County in the 1920s.
Drastic disparities still persist today between communities that are affluent and mostly white, and communities that are more diverse, said Lucas Sanchez, co-executive director of New York Communities for Change, a plaintiff in the Nassau lawsuit County.
“Long Island is a place built on the principle of exclusion, built on the principle of segregation,” he said. “The map as it stands now keeps us away from the table, denies us seats at the table, and this is why we are part of this lawsuit.”
Mary Studdert, spokeswoman for the Republican Majority of the Nassau County Legislature, said the current map is consistent with the law and is the result of public feedback that combines interest groups.
The lawsuit paints a different picture. It says the map splits or combines minority communities with others that are completely different, diluting the political power of their voters.
The lawsuit cites the village of Freeport, which is nearly 44% Latino and 32% Black. On the county map, part of the village was collapsed into a district that includes Merrick, which is predominantly white. The district’s representative will most likely always be someone from Merrick, said Maria Jordan-Awalom, a Latina prosecutor and Freeport resident.
She said a lack of parks and bad roads is one way to differentiate Freeport from Merrick. She also pointed to a local Black Lives Matter protest in 2020 as an example of the differences between the cities. She and at least a hundred protesters marched along what she called an imaginary wall between Freeport and Merrick. Local media reported a public outcry from Merrick residents, with some telling protesters to “go back west” to Freeport.
“We are not connected in any way,” said Jordan-Awalom, who is also chairman of the Freeport School Board. “If the decision makers want to make this choice, connect us and lump us in with this community that doesn’t even want to be part of our community and doesn’t want to have any relationship with us as residents, it’s just a matter of thinking. -mind blow.”
The village of New Hyde Park, also named in the lawsuit, provides another example showing how the redistricting process has diluted the voting power of minority communities.
Nearly a third of residents are Asian, but in the latest round of map drawings the area was removed from the district where Yan lives. Instead, Manhasset, which is predominantly white, was added. Yan plans to run again, but the district’s boundaries do not appear to offer him a successful route, advocates say.
“I don’t want this opportunity to pass me by because whether I win or lose, I’ve always wanted to make sure that Asian Americans have the right representation,” Yan said. “Without people representing us, we have no voice at the table.”
Redistricting experts expect more lawsuits under the new voting rights laws, especially if the current lawsuits are successful. But Grossman of the Civil Liberties Union hopes the challenges will become more of a lesson that prompts jurisdictions to focus on improving parks, libraries, schools and other facilities in minority communities.
“My hope is that these initial cases will form the basis for a much more collaborative solution, because my strong preference is not to see taxpayer dollars going to litigation,” he said. “I hope local governments in New York and elsewhere see state voting rights as an opportunity to do better.”
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