The Supreme Court late yesterday allowed Alabama to use a congressional district map that was based on intentional race discrimination, according to an earlier three-judge court decision.
The ruling almost certainly means that Alabama will have one less Black representative in Congress, and one less Democrat.
It also means that plaintiffs will have an even tougher time proving illegal racial discrimination in legislative districting going forward–that is, even more difficult than after the Court’s recent ruling in Louisiana v. Calais. In other words, yesterday’s ruling, as a practical matter, all but eliminates racial discrimination claims in legislative districting. That’s because the Court made it yet easier (again, easier even than Calais) for states to evade claims of racial discrimination by simply providing political reasons for their maps, even political reasons that overlap with race. And if states can’t even manage that, they can evade claims by playing the courts.
To see all this, here’s a brief history of this up-and-down case:
In 2021, Alabama adopted a new congressional map with just one majority-Black congressional district. A three-judge court ruled that the map violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, because it had a racially discriminatory effect and diluted Black voters’ voting strength. The court ordered the state to adopt a map that included a second district where Black voters could elect a candidate of their choice.
Alabama appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that it didn’t have time to implement the lower court’s ruling. (The lower court issued its ruling in January 2022, and Alabama’s primary election was slated for May 2022.) The Court stayed the lower court ruling and allowed Alabama to use the 2021 map (the one with just one majority-Black district).
The Supreme Court later affirmed the lower court’s ruling (that the 2021 map violated Section 2 of the VRA) and its remedy (to draw a second district where Black voters could elect a candidate of their choice). The Court said that the lower court faithfully applied Court precedent in its ruling and remedy.
In response, in 2023 Alabama adopted another map, also with just one district where Black voters could elect a candidate of their choice. (In other words, the state thumbed its nose at the Supreme Court ruling.)
Plaintiffs then challenged the 2023 map, arguing that it violated both Section 2 of the VRA and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. (Although those are related, they are two different, distinct claims.) The district court ruled that the new map violated the VRA. The court instituted a remedial map, drawn without reference to race. This map governed the 2024 election.
Alabama again appealed to the Supreme Court. While the appeal was pending, the Court decided Callais. Callais revised the test for Section 2 claims under the VRA and made it substantially harder (maybe impossible) for racial minority voters to prove a Section 2 violation. (That’s because Callais now requires plaintiffs to dis-aggregate and account for any state political objective in redistricting–a near impossible feat in the racially-polarized political environments where Section 2 does its work. In other words, after Callais, states can insulate themselves from a Section 2 claim simply by providing political objectives for their gerrymander.)
But Callais did not change the test for equal protection claims.
After it issued Callais, the Court vacated the lower-court ruling and remanded the case for reconsideration in light of Callais. Alabama announced that it would use the 2023 map (which, recall, the district court struck as a racial gerrymander) for the upcoming 2026 election. (The governor called a special primary election for August 11 (months later than the regularly scheduled primary) in four of the districts that were affected by all this.)
On remand, the three-judge district court ruled again that the map violated the VRA. It also ruled that the map was based on intentional racial discrimination in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. (The court said that its earlier decision on intentional racial discrimination was “undisturbed by Callais.” That’s not surprising, because, remember, Callais changed the Section 2 test (for discriminatory effect), not the equal protection test (for discriminatory intent).) It wrote, “[D]espite our searching review of all the evidence before us–much of it directly from the Legislators and Legislature, none of it in dispute–try as we might, we cannot understand the 2023 Plan as anything other than an intentional effort to dilute Black Alabamians’ voting strength and evade the unambiguous requirements of court orders standing in the way.” (Just a quick note on that: Under Supreme Court precedent, without direct evidence of racial discrimination, it’s tough–really tough–to prove that a racial gerrymander is based on intentional racial discrimination.)
Yesterday, the Supreme Court stayed that ruling. In a brief, shadow-docket opinion, the Court wrote that the district court failed to apply a presumption of good faith to the state’s behavior and failed to apply the new Callais standard.
Significantly, the Court extended the new Callais standard to the equal protection claim, writing, “And, as to both claims, the District Court’s analysis departed from Callais.” (Recall that Callais revised the standard for Section 2 claims under the VRA. Callais said nothing about equal protection claims like the one at issue in this case.) This shoehorns the new Callais standard into equal protection claims and makes it equally difficult (or impossible) for plaintiffs to challenge a racial gerrymander under the Equal Protection Clause as it now is to challenge a racial gerrymander under the VRA.
The ruling also validated the state’s efforts to manipulate the courts. Recall that the state previously told the Court that it couldn’t comply with the first district court ruling, because it didn’t have enough time before its scheduled election (from January 2022 to May 2022). Yet the state now says that it can switch from the district court’s earlier remedial map (which the state used in the 2024 elections) to the 2023 map for the 2026 primary elections–on a much tighter timeline. Moreover, recall that the state ignored the Court’s earlier ruling that affirmed the district court’s holding that the 2023 map likely violated the VRA and the district court’s order requiring the state to draw a second majority Black district. The Court’s ruling yesterday validates all this behavior.
Justice Sotomayor dissented, joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson. She concluded, “Because I choose to defend the rule of law and the right of all Alabamians to participate equally in democracy, I respectfully dissent.”
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