WASHINGTON — In attempting to defend the Virginia GOP’s racist House maps, Speaker Kirk Cox is touting Virginia Republicans’ shocking diversity problem.
Of the 51 Republicans serving in the House, there isn’t a single African-American, women make up less than 10 percent of the caucus, and they have zero openly-LGBTQ legislators.
“Speaker Cox leads a caucus that looks nothing like Virginia or our district here in Chesterfield. The Republican side of the aisle is overwhelmingly comprised of white men — and that lack of diversity puts the GOP out of touch with real Virginians and the issues we face on a daily basis,” said Sheila Bynum-Coleman, who is challenging Cox in House District 66. “If Cox was serious about diversity and minority recruitment, he’d stop defending his racist maps, work to protect health care, and finally act on gun safety.”
Today the Supreme Court ruled Cox and the House did not have standing to overturn fair maps in favor of the racially gerrymandered maps he continues to defend. The new map shifts the speaker’s district from Republican-leaning lines that favored the GOP by 25 points to a blue district that favors Democrats by 6.5 points.
“If Speaker Cox wants to continue defending his racist gerrymandered maps, there’s certainly poetic justice in him losing to Sheila Bynum-Coleman, an African-American woman,” said Jessica Post, executive director of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee. “Virginia Republicans look more like an old boys’ club than a modern political party. The GOP has a stunning diversity problem and they’re not doing enough to correct it.”
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