After a federal court threw out Texas Republicans’ redistricting map this month because it discriminated against minorities, a three-judge panel today released a new map that will significantly boost minority representation in Congress.

Though the Republican-controlled Texas legislature was originally tasked with drawing the state’s new congressional districts, the map they produced was not only highly-partisan, but discriminated against the state’s burgeoning minority population. Texas, which is one of a handful of states that must get federal approval under the Voting Rights Act for new redistricting maps, saw its proposal nixed by the District Court of DC two weeks ago. As a result, three federal judges in San Antonio were charged with creating a new map for next year’s elections.

Their proposal today is far more equitable for Texas’ growing minority population, particularly Latinos. The Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund praised the new plan, calling it an “important victory for Latinos in Texas.” It creates a new “Latino opportunity district” in South Texas (TX-35) where Latino voters won’t be disenfranchised or split up, but rather enabled to elect a candidate of their choosing. In total, four new districts will boost minority representation.

Given the Texas’ Latino surge, it’s no surprise that the original map was thrown out in favor one that was fairer to minorities. Over the past decade, two-thirds of Texas’ population growth has been Latinos, while blacks accounted for another 22 percent. Whites increased by just four percent since 2000.

This population boom earned Texas four new congressional seats, the largest gain of any state. Currently, Republicans enjoy a 23-9 advantage among Texas’ 32 seats, but redistricting analyst Charles Kuffner did a thorough examination of the new districts and predicted that after the dust settles next year, Democrats would gain four seats. The Houston Chronicle, meanwhile, predicted a possible three-seat pickup for Democrats.

Interested parties have until Friday to comment on the court’s proposed map. Kuffner predicts the map “will be finalized by Monday the 28th, which is the opening of filing season, though I hear that could possibly get pushed back a day.”

From the moment President Obama took office, Senate Republicans waged a campaign of delay and obstruction against his judicial nominees. Indeed, the problem became so bad that conservative Chief Justice John Roberts felt the need to speak out about the urgent vacancy crisis this campaign created. So it is very unfortunate that a key Senate committee recently decided to roll back the pace of confirmation hearings:

The U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee has decided to slow down nomination hearings to give time to confirm pending nominees.

There are currently 23 nominees awaiting final votes in the Senate. Some, as in the case of Caitlin Halligan of Washington, D.C., have been waiting more than 400 days for a vote.

The committee on Nov. 16 met and decided to slow down the nomination hearings.

As a practical matter, this development is unlikely to slow the confirmations process more than its current snail’s pace. Because the Judiciary Committee operates under the radical assumptions that 1) a majority of the committee should get to actually approve a nominee; and 2) the minority should not be allowed to delay votes indefinitely, this Committee has actually managed to clear nominees at a reasonable pace.

The same cannot be said, however, for the Senate floor. There, of course, it takes 60 votes to get nearly anything done — but it really takes all 100 votes to get anything done quickly. That’s because the Senate’s broken rules allow dissenting senators to impose crippling delays on the body as a whole any time the majority tries to advance something that anyone at all objects to. As a result, President Obama’s nominees consistently clear the committee. And then wait. And wait. And wait.

So the Judiciary Committee’s decision to slow down hearings really just brings one of the Senate’s still functioning arms in line with it’s completely broken floor process. Nevertheless, it is an unfortunate development. By generating a backlog of nominees awaiting confirmation, the committee could at least hope to embarrass obstructionists into action. Now, they won’t even have that lever at their disposal anymore.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch proposed a plan for Mercedes-Benz’s SUV plant in Alabama after one of the automaker’s German managers, Detlev Hager, was arrested under Alabama’s draconian immigration law — move the factory to Missouri instead. The paper’s editorial board lays out their reasons in today’s editorial:

Our state has many advantages over Alabama. We are the Show-Me State, not the “Show me your papers” state. Our Legislature is hostile on the immigration issue, but not as hostile as Alabama’s or Arizona’s. [...]

We realize that moving a massive automotive plant is quite the undertaking, but we happen to have space for one in Fenton and a lot of trained autoworkers. A lot.

We have a state law that offers up to $100 million in tax incentives for automobile plant expansion; in the last 12 months Ford and General Motors have expanded operations here. We probably could come up with a lot more for a brand new plant. [...]

You’ve got two choices. Either ask your executives to carry their immigration papers at all times, or move to a state that understands gemüchlichkeit.

Some business leaders are worried that the extreme immigration law will scare away foreign investors; by 2014, Mercedes will have invested $4 billion in Alabama after opening its first U.S. factory in the state in 1993. And with about 2,800 people employed by Mercedes in Alabama, losing the investment would compound the economic damage the immigration law is already causing in Alabama.

Mercedes-Benz spokeswoman Felyicia Jerald said in an email to ThinkProgress that the company was not commenting about the immigration law’s impact on Mercedes’ business in Alabama, but she said that “Mercedes-Benz will take steps to educate our visiting business guests and employees stationed in the U.S. of the documentation requirements for the State of Alabama.” Now the St. Louis Post-Dispatch has explained one way Mercedes could avoid having to make sure their foreign employees have their papers with them at all times.

During last night’s national security debate, emerging GOP presidential frontrunner Newt Gingrich explained that he would support giving undocumented immigrants legal status without offering citizenship. “If you’ve been here 25 years and you got three kids and two grandkids, you’ve been paying taxes and obeying the law, you belong to a local church, I don’t think we’re going to separate you from your family, uproot you forcefully and kick you out,” he said.

Former frontrunner Mitt Romney’s campaign immediately saw a chance to present their candidate as the anti-immigrant candidate to an increasingly nativist GOP electorate. After the debate, Romney advisor Eric Fehrnstrom said Gingrich was setting up a plan to offer amnesty to undocumented immigrants like the 1986 amnesty act. But while attacking Gingrich for supposedly supporting amnesty, Fehrnstrom couldn’t explain what Romney’s plan would be — beyond creating a hostile environment, that is:

I followed up by asking Fehrnstrom whether Romney believed in deporting those immigrants who are already here illegally.

“He doesn’t believe in granting them amnesty,” Fehrnstrom responded. [...]

Finally, after I asked the question for a seventh time, Fehrnstrom responded by emphasizing employer enforcement as a way to get illegal immigrants to leave through attrition.

“Well, if you cut off their employment, if they can’t get work, if they can’t get benefits like in state tuition, they will leave,” he said. [...]

Just to be clear, I wanted to know about those that still could remain under such a scenario.

“I just answered your question Phil, and you keep hectoring me about it,” he snapped. “You turn off the magnets, no in state tuition, no benefits of any kind, no employment. You put in place an employment verification system with penalties for employers that hire illegals, that will shut off access to the job market, and they will self retreat.They will go to their native countries.”

Surprisingly, this is actually a significant move to the left for Romney. In 2008, Romney actually suggested that he could support mass deportations so long as undocumented immigrants with deep roots in this United States are given “enough time to organize their affairs and go home.” Nevertheless, Romney’s newest position still aligns him very closely with the far right. At the end of the day, Romney’s immigration plan boils down to the Alabama plan under HB 56: create conditions so terrible that they’d have to leave.

Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber (D) made a surprising announcement yesterday: no executions would take place in the Beaver State while he is in office.

Currently, 36 Oregon inmates sit on death row. One prisoner, Gary Haugen, had been set to die in two weeks.

Speaking at a Salem press conference, Kitzhaber explained his decision to place a moratorium on capital punishment, calling the practice “a perversion” that “fails to meet the basic standards of justice. The Oregonian has more:

Gov. John Kitzhaber announced today he will not allow the execution of Gary Haugen — or any death row inmate — to take place while he is in office.

The death penalty is morally wrong and unjustly administered, Kitzhaber said. [...]

“Both because of my own deep personal convictions about capital punishment and also because in practice, Oregon has an expensive and unworkable system that fails to meet basic standards of justice.”

Oregon’s move follows a recent trend among states away from capital punishment. Since 2007, three more states – Illinois, New Jersey, and New Mexico – have abolished the death penalty, bringing the total number of states that shun the practice to 15. The District of Columbia has also abolished the death penalty.