Supreme Court Move Puts Alabama Redistricting Back In Play

WASHINGTON, May 11 (Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way on Monday for Alabama Republicans to pursue a congressional voting map more favorable to the GOP ahead of November’s midterm elections, the latest fallout from the court’s seismic voting rights ruling.

The justices lifted a lower court’s decision that had blocked state Republicans’ preferred map as racially discriminatory and for illegally diluting the voting power of black Alabamians.

Federal courts had previously ruled Alabama’s map likely violated the Voting Rights Act by failing to create a second majority-black district in the state.

The Supreme Court said the lower courts must reconsider previous rulings in light of the high court’s recent decision in the Voting Rights Act case, Louisiana v. Callais, which struck down a majority-black district in that state as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. The ruling limited how race can be used in drawing congressional districts under the Voting Rights Act. President Donald Trump called on states to redraw maps after that decision.

Alabama is expected to revert to a map passed in 2023, which would reduce the number of districts where black voters comprise a majority or near-majority from two to one of the state’s seven U.S. House districts.

According to CBS News, the ruling “appears to be 6 to 3.” Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by fellow liberal Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, broke with the majority in a written dissent, arguing the lower court’s conclusion that Alabama deliberately discriminated against black voters should remain in place. Sotomayor was the only justice to disclose their vote publicly, The Hill reported.

The ruling could reshape control of the U.S. House by allowing states to redraw maps to reduce minority-opportunity districts.

Alabama is one of several red Southern states attempting to redraw its congressional map before the November midterms.

Tennessee lawmakers approved a congressional map expected to hand Republicans control of all nine of the Volunteer State’s congressional districts. The map, signed by Republican Gov. Bill Lee, spreads out the heavily Democratic population centers in Memphis and Nashville across multiple Republican-favorable districts and is likely to eliminate the state’s lone Democratic seat, currently held by Rep. Steve Cohen of Memphis.

In Florida, Republicans led by Gov. Ron DeSantis passed new congressional district boundaries projected to give the GOP four additional House seats.

Lawmakers in Louisiana, South Carolina, and Mississippi are also reviewing potential redistricting plans that could further shift seats to Republicans.

Before the Supreme Court decision last week, Alabama had been required to maintain one majority-black district and a second with a near-majority black population under an interpretation of the Voting Rights Act that has now been ruled an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. After the ruling, Attorney General Steve Marshall, a Republican, said the state would move quickly to ensure its maps “reflect the will of the people, not a racial quota system the Constitution forbids.”

“The Court rightly acknowledged that the South has made extraordinary progress, and that laws designed for a different era do not reflect the present reality,” Marshall stated.