![\"Denver](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Denver-Harbor-1000x750.jpg\")
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Andrew Schneider\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n
The Denver Harbor Multi-Service Center is located on Market Street in the Denver Harbor neighborhood of Houston\u2019s East End.<\/p>\n
In a Houston neighborhood near the city’s port, residents worry their problems \u2014 and their votes \u2014 will be unheard if Texas state lawmakers go ahead with a mid-decade congressional redistricting plan<\/a>. It’s part of an attempt by Republicans, at the urging of President Donald Trump, to give their party an edge in next year\u2019s elections for Congress. As a result, those residents could go from a district long represented by Democrats to one that tilts Republican.<\/p>\n Denver Harbor, a neighborhood in Houston’s East End, is roughly 90% Latino and tends to vote Democratic. It’s a mix of small homes and small industry. One of the major concerns for residents has been deportations.<\/p>\n “Everybody’s nervous,” said Rene Porras, a Vietnam combat veteran and small business owner. “I have a little local taqueria, Mexican bakery, and business is down for the last three or four weeks. I mean, really down. And I talked to my other friends that have businesses and the same thing. Where did the immigrants go?”<\/p>\n Andrew Schneider\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n Rene Porras<\/p>\n Rita Robles is a community activist in Denver Harbor who underscored the problem.<\/p>\n Click here for more inDepth features.<\/a><\/p>\n “When they started saying that ICE<\/a> was going to be in the area \u2014 we\u2019ve spotted them in certain areas where they\u2019re huddling together, before they go do a raid, and that has scared the hell out of the people here,” Robles said.<\/p>\n Denver Harbor’s proposed new congressional district<\/strong><\/p>\n Immigration is one of the big issues facing Texas’ 29th Congressional District, where Denver Harbor currently sits. For 30 years, it’s been represented by Democrats in the U.S. House, currently U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia. But if Republican state lawmakers get their way, as urged by Trump, the neighborhood and most of eastern Houston will be sliced off and melded to eastern suburbs and exurbs in a new 9th Congressional District.<\/p>\n Porras said he’s angry.<\/p>\n “Since Trump’s proposed this,” Porras said, “he’s so unpopular around here, it’s incredible. Everything from cutting services and Medicaid, all the things he didn’t mention during the election, or said he’s not going to cut, that’s exactly what he’s doing.”<\/p>\n Robles is particularly concerned about what the redrawn district would mean for the environmental health of the neighborhood, which sits just a few miles from the Houston Ship Channel<\/a>.<\/p>\n “We have a very big problem with air pollution,” Robles said. “We already have a large number of people in our area that suffer from health problems, and then on top of that, you suffer from things like asthma, emphysema, COPD, those type of things. And a lot of those type of breathing problems, they\u2019re associated with particle air pollution. I myself am one. I\u2019m an asthmatic, I go outside, and sometimes it\u2019s just so hard to breathe, I just have to stay inside. So, it\u2019s difficult.”<\/p>\n Andrew Schneider\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n Rita Robles is a community activist in Houston\u2019s Denver Harbor neighborhood.<\/p>\n Robles said people in Denver Harbor don’t make much money compared to the neighborhoods it would be joined with in the new district \u2013 neighborhoods currently located in Texas\u2019 Republican-held 2nd and 36th Congressional Districts.<\/p>\n “They make six figures, you know, anywhere from $50,000, $60,000 and up to six figures,” Robles said of her prospective neighbors. “They don\u2019t have these types of problems that we do.”<\/p>\n An analysis by the Texas Legislative Council<\/a>, an agency that provides research for state lawmakers, shows that while the current 29th Congressional District voted for Democrat Kamala Harris for president last year, voters who would be in the new District 9 went for Trump by a wide margin.<\/p>\n Why the GOP is seeking a new District 9<\/strong><\/p>\n But Republicans note that, while Denver Harbor’s current district twists and turns across Houston, its proposed new home is more compact. And it would still be majority Hispanic, even though Democratic leaders might not like how they vote.<\/p>\n “I think this is actually the way the new maps are drawn is really more indicative of how Harris County has changed demographically,” said Cindy Siegel, chair of the Harris County Republican Party. <\/p>\n Siegel argued that if Democrats are upset by the proposed new map, it’s because they realize that they’ve taken Hispanic voters for granted, and now they pay a price for it. <\/p>\n “They know that there has been a shift in the last election that the Hispanic community, more Hispanic voters, in fact, supported President Trump, voted for him,” Siegel said.<\/p>\n Still, Siegel acknowledged the redistricting plan is also about seeking a partisan advantage. And she said that’s only fair, given how Democrats have behaved in the past. She noted it’s only been a few years since Democrats, who then had a 3-to-2 majority on Harris County Commissioners Court, forced through a local redistricting plan<\/a> that gave them a 4-to-1 supermajority.<\/p>\n “The Democrats didn\u2019t say anything about it. They didn\u2019t oppose it,” Siegel said. “There were voters that were conservatives … thousands that were moved in, for example, where I live, that were moved into [Democratic County Commissioner] Rodney Ellis\u2019 out of what was the old [Republican-represented] Precinct 3.”<\/p>\n Andrew Schneider\/Houston Public Media<\/p>\n Cindy Siegel is chair of the Harris County Republican Party.<\/p>\n A redistricting arms race?<\/strong><\/p>\n Texas House Majority Leader Tom Oliverson, who represents Cypress in northwest Harris County, told Hello Houston that partisan gain was, in fact, the main reason for the redistricting plan.<\/p>\n “I think it’s well within our right to do so,” Oliverson said. “There are many, many states where redistricting for partisan performance has been a way of life for 20, 30 years, particularly in Democrat states.”<\/p>\n But partisan redistricting can overlap with racial gerrymandering, which is illegal under the Voting Rights Act. Michael O. Adams, a political science professor at Texas Southern University, said the apparent Hispanic majority of the proposed new 9th Congressional District is deceptive and does not reflect its likely voting majority.<\/p>\n “I think what we\u2019re seeing here, and what we\u2019re witnessing in this redistricting proposal in the midterm cycle, is what I would call a master class in demographic manipulation,” Adams said.<\/p>\n![\"Rene](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Rene-Porras-1000x750.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Houston's](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Map-pic-1000x505.jpg\")
Houston\u2019s congressional map prior to March 2025 (left) and its proposed new congressional map (right).<\/p>\n![\"Rita](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Rita-Robles-1000x750.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"Cindy](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Cindy-Siegel-1000x750.jpg\")
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