Thursday, October 6, 2022

Supreme Court Poised to Shred What's Left of Voting Rights Act, Plaintiffs Warn

"If the court sides with Alabama," wrote a pair of plaintiffs in Merrill v. Milligan, "political opportunities for people of color will disappear."

photo credit: David Sachs

"If the court's right-wing supermajority has its way, Merrill v. Milligan will open the floodgates for racial gerrymandering across the country and diminish the political power of voters of color," Stand Up America deputy political director Reggie Thedford said Monday in a statement.

Although Black voters comprise nearly one-third of Alabama's population, the congressional map approved last November by the state's GOP-controlled Legislature contains just one majority-Black district out of seven total districts—the illegal result, civil rights advocates argued successfully in a lawsuit filed in federal district court, of "packing" most Black voters into a single district and "cracking" others across multiple districts. To date, no Black candidate in Alabama has ever won in a majority-white congressional district.

A trio of federal judges—including two appointed by former President Donald Trump—unanimously sided with the plaintiffs, ruling that Alabama's recently adopted congressional map unconstitutionally denies equal representation and likely violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA) by diminishing Black voters' ability to elect candidates of their choice.

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