WATCH: MSNBC Contributor Calls for Biden to Deploy a ‘Federal Takeover’ of Elections in Texas

MSNBC contributor Jason Johnson argued Tuesday that the Biden administration should engage in a “federal takeover” of elections in Texas.

He made the comment in a segment with MSNBC’s Joy Reid, who said Republicans were “stealing” elections and bewailed the decennial redistricting lines proposed by the Texas House of Representatives. President Joe Biden’s Justice Department sued the state on Monday over the proposal, alleging that minority voters should be positioned in the districts differently.

“These districts they make look like a Dexter blood splatter, they’re just pieces here and there for whatever Republicans want,” Johnson said. “This is an emergency. I know this is something that hasn’t been done in 56 years, but you know what happened when the federal government said, ‘Hey, Brown vs. Board of Education, we have to integrate schools?’ They sent troops. They sent federal officials to places and said, ‘You will let Black children into school.'”

“This administration can say we have concerns about how elections are being conducted in this particular state. We’re going to send officials down there. We’re going to send election observers. If we think people’s civil rights are being violated, we’ll do a federal takeover. I know lots of people are going to scream about this. The right-wingers are going to scream. This is what the federal government is supposed to do. If states are violating people’s civil rights, you’re supposed to step in.”

Texas has battled with the feds in court over the shape of its congressional districts every decade since the Voting Rights Act took effect in 1965. However, it is the first time the state has redistricted since a 2013 Supreme Court ruling that made it more difficult for the feds to intervene. The court’s Shelby County v. Holder decision that year changed a 40-year-old formula for redistricting, effectively raising the burden of proof required for the federal government to prove discrimination and interfere with district lines.

Watch above via MSNBC.