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Voting Rights Project
Voting Rights Project

The UCLA Voting Rights Project is a project of the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs aimed at creating an accessible and equitable system of voting for all Americans through impact litigation, research, and clinical education to expand access to the ballot box.

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Court Filings & Opinions Democracy & Voting Rights

Portugal et al. v. Franklin County et al.

Published October 12, 2020

Franklin County’s electoral system has diluted Latino votes and has served as an effective barrier in preventing Latinos from having an equal opportunity to elect their candidates of choice.

Contributors

Chad W. Dunn Experts

Sonni Waknin Staff

Vivian Alejandre Fellows

Tye Rush Fellows

Michael Rios Staff

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Overview:

Today, the UCLA Voting Rights Project, along with the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) served a notice letter to the Franklin County Commission challenging the County Commission’s electoral system for diluting the voting power of the Latino/a population in Franklin County.

Of the 95,222 Franklin County residents, over 50% (51,001) of its resident population are Latino and over one-third (34.4%) of the citizen voting age population are Latino. Despite the large Latino population, a Latino candidate of choice has not been elected to the Franklin County Commission in the past 20 years.