A San Diego Superior Court judge denied a request for a temporary restraining order (TRO) that would have restored a community of Catholic Christians from Iraq that has been split in two by San Diego County's Independent Redistricting Commission.
Judge Eddie Sturgeon declared that voting rights are sacred and fundamental constitutional rights but because of looming election deadlines chose not to enjoin the Commission, the Registrar of Voters Cynthina Paes, and the County from using the county's 2021 Supervisorial District Map, according to a press release.
“It dilutes their political voice and it's possible that in the future if someone from their community wants to run for a county supervisor seat, the community is now split,” said attorney Paul Jonna, who represents the plaintiffs. “But we are confident that we will ultimately prevail in this case and obtain a judicial ruling that unifies the Chaldean voice once again.”
The California Supreme Court has held in previous legal claims that district boundaries may not be drawn in a manner that splits up a geographically-compact racial or ethnic minority group.
“The Chaldean community is an ancient community that immigrated from Iraq who speak Aramaic, which is the native language of Jesus,” Jonna told the Southern California Record. “It's a community of about 50,000 people all primarily in this one region that's traditionally always been in District 2 in San Diego and the Commission, in an arbitrary way without thinking about the impacts to this community, split them in the middle and pulled them into a more left-leaning district.”
During last week’s hearing, the defendants argued it was too late to remedy the situation before the primary election on June 7 and that they wanted to protect the African American community.
“The data just didn't support their justification,” Jonna said. “They made a lot of different arguments but their main focus was that it can’t be fixed before the 2022 elections and the judge was very worried about this so the court bought that argument, reluctantly. He said we need to fix this at least for the next election and that this needs to be carefully looked at before 2024.”
Although Sturgeon ruled against the TRO, the case continues.
“We’ve served discovery and we are trying to get this adjudicated before later this year with the hope that any order would apply to correct these lines for the next election,” Jonna said.
Jonna blames a local nonprofit called the Partnership for the Advancement of New Americans (PANA), which serves Muslims and other refugees in San Diego County.
The March 4 complaint states that PANA’s only paid officer is its founder Ramla Sahid whose salary allegedly is derived from Black Lives Matter.
"The San Diego Independent Redistricting Commission is supposed to be an independent bipartisan commission but they were influenced by PANA, which is left-leaning," Jonna added. "The Chaldean community is traditionally a very conservative, overwhelmingly Republican community. So, it does seem to us that there was a desire on the part of PANA to fragment this community for political reasons to protect their own interests."