The US Supreme Court has ruled 6-3 that Alabama can use a redrawn congressional map eliminating one of its two majority-Black districts for the 2026 midterm elections, marking a victory for Republicans and a setback for Black voters. The emergency ruling, issued on Tuesday, is the most consequential since the court's April decision in Louisiana v Callais, which made it harder to win Voting Rights Act claims by requiring proof of intentional discrimination.
A three-judge panel had previously blocked the map, finding it was enacted with discriminatory intent. However, the Supreme Court's conservative majority said the panel failed to reconsider the case in light of the Callais decision and other recent rulings weakening the Voting Rights Act. The justices wrote that the lower court did not give the legislature a presumption of good faith and did not meet a new test from Callais regarding alternative maps.
In a sharp dissent, liberal justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson accused the majority of causing chaos and abandoning the rule of law. Sotomayor warned of a 'chaotic election' under a map that 'intentionally discriminates against Black Alabamians' and requires last-minute changes to voter registrations.
The ruling is the latest in a long legal battle over Alabama's congressional map. After the 2020 census, the state enacted a plan with six Republican districts and one Democratic majority-Black district. Black voters sued, and in 2023 the Supreme Court upheld a lower court order requiring two majority-Black districts. Alabama's subsequent map, which again had only one such district, was blocked, and a special master drew a map with two majority-Black districts used in the 2024 election.
Following the Callais decision, Alabama moved its primaries and sought to implement the 2023 map again. The three-judge panel blocked it on 26 May, citing intentional discrimination. The state has held some primaries, but Republican Governor Kay Ivey delayed four congressional primaries until August.
