In a big win for the Keller Independent School District, a federal judge dismissed a voting rights lawsuit led by left-leaning activists, which had attempted to revoke the district’s decades‑old system for electing trustees as racially discriminatory.
A January 15 opinion by U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor found the suit “frivolous, unreasonable, and without foundation.”
O’Connor dismissed all claims with prejudice, awarded Keller ISD its attorneys’ fees, and ordered the plaintiff to show cause for why sanctions should not be imposed.
The lawsuit, Vallejo v. Keller ISD, asserted claims under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, alleging that the district’s at‑large voting system “denies Hispanic voters a fair opportunity to elect representatives of their choosing, illegally diluting their votes.”
O’Connor wrote that plaintiff Claudio Vallejo admitted Hispanic voters “cannot form a minority-majority, single-member district” with a citizen voting-age population of 50 percent or more from a single racial group, “and so his VRA claim fails.”
The judge also crushed Vallejo’s arguments invoking a coalition of minority voters, noting the U.S. Fifth Circuit’s decision in the Petteway v. Galveston County redistricting case held that “coalition claims do not comport with Section 2’s statutory language or with Supreme Court cases interpreting Section 2.”
His attempt to argue that his theory is permissible because it advances “coalition politics,” not a geographic “coalition-district,” is completely foreclosed: “[t]he statutory text points to only one conclusion, that coalition claims are impermissible.”
O’Connor also dismantled the plaintiff’s proposed “cumulative voting” solution as unlawful, stating “this is exactly what the Supreme Court has disallowed:” granting minority voters the right to preserve their voting strength for the purposes of forging an “advantageous political alliance” with voters outside the minority group.
“A big win for KISD!” Keller ISD Trustee John Birt posted to social media. “The Court dismissed the ‘frivolous’ lawsuit and KISD is entitled to recover all legal fees!”
“With this litigation behind us, we can now focus on where our time and resources matter the most: our students, teachers and community stakeholders,” wrote Birt.
“The judge didn’t just reject the lawsuit, he made it clear that it never had any legitimate legal basis to begin with,” wrote Keller ISD Trustee Chris Coker in response to the ruling.
Coker stated that the district has had to spend approximately $250,000 “defending against a politically-motivated attack disguised as a civil rights case” now dismissed as “frivolous.”
“Unfortunately, this is becoming a pattern across Texas. Left-leaning activists and organizations are filing lawsuits not to win in court, but to intimidate conservative school boards and city councils, drain public resources, and influence policy through litigation they can’t achieve at the ballot box,” stated Coker. “The Keller ISD school board stood its ground, followed the law, and refused to be bullied.”
“The court’s decision is a victory for common sense and for the voters who elected this board to represent them,” added Coker. “I hope this ruling sends a clear message that weaponizing the courts for political purposes is not governance, and taxpayers shouldn’t have to foot the bill for it.”
Keller mom and Tarrant County GOP Precinct Chair Kathy May also applauded the court’s decision.
“Federal Judge Reed O’Connor just dismissed with prejudice the VRA lawsuit pushed by two white liberal activists (Laney Hawes & Dixie Davis) who recruited a Hispanic plaintiff to claim Keller ISD’s at large elections ‘diluted’ minority votes,” May posted on social media.
May said Vallejo tried dragging in “purely political conservative policies” as “evidence” of racism, but Judge O’Connor “shut it down as totally irrelevant, proving this was never about voting rights… it was lawfare to attack a conservative board.”
“His ruling proves their playbook is dead,” said May, citing leftist activists’ “endless lawfare, media hit pieces, and nonstop attacks” on conservative policies and board members.
“Lawfare is crushing ISD taxpayers,” May added. “Why does anyone in Keller ISD still listen to them?”
Jackson Walker, the law firm representing Keller ISD and its trustees, claimed “a complete victory” in the case.
“Fee awards and potential sanctions are rare in civil-rights matters, making this ruling particularly significant for public entities frequently targeted by ideologically driven or speculative claims,” Jackson Walker partner Tim Davis wrote in a news release touting the win.
The plaintiff’s law firm, Brewer Storefront, has claimed past success in forcing several North Texas school districts to adopt single-member voting districts since 2014, including Richardson, Carrollton-Farmers Branch, and Grand Prairie ISDs.
O’Connor’s ruling, coupled with the Fifth Circuit’s Petteway decision rejecting minority-coalition districts, calls those cases into question.
“Every Brewer Storefront single-member settlement across North Texas ISDs needs to be revisited,” added May.
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