{"id":128,"date":"2026-06-03T04:23:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T04:23:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=128"},"modified":"2026-06-03T04:23:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T04:23:16","slug":"supreme-court-permits-alabama-to-use-congressional-map-struck-by-lower-court-as-racially-discriminatory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=128","title":{"rendered":"Supreme Court permits Alabama to use congressional map struck by lower court as racially discriminatory"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The Supreme Court on Tuesday night cleared the way for Alabama to use a congressional map in the 2026 elections that lower courts found to be racially discriminatory. In a four-page, , the court held that that \u201cthe District Court\u2019s analysis departed from\u201d the Supreme Court\u2019s April 29 decision in\u00a0Louisiana v.<\/em>\u00a0Callais<\/em>, in which the court (among other things) made it more difficult for plaintiffs to prevail on a claim that a map violates a key provision of the Voting Rights Act.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Read more The radical Justice Thomas<\/a><\/p>\n

Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote a dissenting opinion, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, in which she criticized the majority for paving the way toward \u201ca chaotic election.\u201d The majority \u201cdisregards both democratic values and the rule of law,\u201d Sotomayor contended.<\/p>\n

The court\u2019s ruling, which came after 9 p.m. EDT on Tuesday, was likely the final chapter in a dispute that began in 2021, when Alabama enacted a new map in the wake of the 2020 census. Black voters and civil rights organizations challenged the map in federal court, arguing that it violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits racial discrimination in voting, because it divided Black voters in the southern part of the state among three different congressional districts, leaving them a minority in each.<\/p>\n

After concluding that the 2021 map likely violated Section 2, the lower court barred Alabama from using the map. Alabama appealed to the Supreme Court, which in 2023 upheld the lower court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n

Alabama then drew a new map, which voters and civil rights groups again challenged as a violation of Section 2. A lower court agreed with them and blocked Alabama from using that map, as well. The lower court instructed Alabama to use a map created by a court-appointed special master instead.<\/p>\n

Alabama\u00a0returned\u00a0to the Supreme Court, which last month, in a one-paragraph order, \u00a0back to the lower court for it to reconsider its ruling in light of the Supreme Court\u2019s decision in Callais<\/em>. Sotomayor\u00a0\u00a0from the court\u2019s order, in an opinion joined by Kagan and Jackson. Sotomayor argued that the lower court did not need to take another look at the dispute because it had also ruled that \u201cAlabama violated the Fourteenth Amendment by intentionally diluting the votes of Black voters in Alabama\u201d \u2013 a finding that \u201cis independent of, and unaffected by, any of the legal issues discussed in\u00a0Callais<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more The state of the death penalty at the Supreme Court<\/a><\/p>\n

Just over two weeks later, on May 26, the lower court \u2013 which included one Clinton appointee and two Trump appointees \u2013 again\u00a0barred Alabama\u00a0from using the 2023 map, directing it to use the map created by the special master instead. The court emphasized that \u201cwe cannot see our way clear to requiring Alabamians to cast their votes in the 2026 elections under a districting plan tainted by intentional race-based discrimination.\u201d<\/p>\n

On May 27, Alabama\u00a0came\u00a0back to the Supreme Court, the justices to pause the lower court\u2019s ruling and allow it to use the 2023 map in the 2026 elections. Alabama Solicitor General A. Barrett Bowdre argued that the court\u2019s decision in \u201cCallais<\/em> vindicates Alabama\u2019s position on the lawfulness of the 2023 Plan, yet the district court decided in one week that\u00a0Callais<\/em>\u00a0changed nothing.\u201d The district court, Bowdre stressed, did not require the challengers to offer alternative maps that would achieve Alabama\u2019s goals while still maintaining two majority-Black districts, as the Supreme Court suggested it should have, and \u201c[i]t did not matter to the district court that drawing an additional race-based district came at the cost of sacrificing communities of interest\u201d \u2013 specifically, predominantly white communities along the state\u2019s Gulf Coast \u2013 \u201cand pairing incumbents.\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u00a0\u00a0 it was too late for the Supreme Court to intervene. They pointed to testimony by a senior election official indicating that if the state wanted to implement the 2023 map, it would have to finish reassigning voters in its voter registration database by June 2. Indeed, they , \u201cthe evidence in the record shows that Alabama cannot administer\u201d a special primary election in August, under a law passed by the state\u2019s legislature in May to account for the possibility that the Supreme Court\u2019s decision in Callais<\/em> would allow Alabama to use its 2023 map, even if the Supreme Court had granted Alabama\u2019s request on June 1. Moreover, they added, the Supreme Court\u2019s decision in Callais<\/em> should make no difference to the lower court\u2019s ruling in their case, because of the lower court\u2019s conclusion that Alabama violated the Constitution by intentionally discriminating against Black voters.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court stated that the district court \u201cfailed to follow our instruction in Callais<\/em> that the mere fact that voters of different races vote for different parties is not relevant to proving racially polarized voting patterns.\u201d It further held that the district court\u2019s decision, not Alabama\u2019s request for relief, had come too late. \u201cWe have repeatedly cautioned that lower federal courts should not \u2018alter the election rules on the eve of an election,\u2019\u201d the court said. \u201cHere, the District Court interposed itself into Alabama\u2019s ongoing efforts to conduct its imminent 2026 congressional elections under maps that its elected representatives selected. Its view that conducting the elections under court-imposed maps would be more convenient for the State was not a valid justification for that intervention.\u201d<\/p>\n

In her 17-page dissent, Sotomayor asserted that Alabama \u201chas no legitimate interest in enforcing an unconstitutional map, while vast harms will likely arise from upending the status quo, sowing chaos in Alabama, and rewarding Alabama\u2019s gamesmanship.\u201d \u201cBecause I choose to defend the rule of law and the right of all Alabamians to participate equally in democracy,\u201d Sotomayor concluded, \u201cI respectfully dissent.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Court asked to bar Alabama from using state\u2019s preferred map<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Supreme Court on Tuesday night cleared the way for Alabama to use a congressional map in the 2026 elections that lower courts found to be racially discriminatory. In a four-page, , the court held that that \u201cthe District Court\u2019s analysis departed from\u201d the Supreme Court\u2019s April 29 decision in\u00a0Louisiana v.\u00a0Callais, in which the court […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":127,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-court-news"],"yoast_head":"\nSupreme Court permits Alabama to use congressional map struck by lower court as racially discriminatory - American Service Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=128\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Supreme Court permits Alabama to use congressional map struck by lower court as racially discriminatory - American Service Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Supreme Court on Tuesday night cleared the way for Alabama to use a congressional map in the 2026 elections that lower courts found to be racially discriminatory. 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