Alabama Asks U.S. Supreme Court to Retain Republican-Drawn Congressional Lines
Washington — In an effort to fight a court order to create a second district with a Black voter majority or close to it, Alabama has requested the U.S. Supreme Court to allow them to keep their current Republican-drawn congressional lines. Despite previously losing this redistricting case at the Supreme Court, Alabama is making another appeal, hoping for a different outcome with their newest GOP version of the map. The state has asked the justices to halt a ruling issued by a three-judge panel last week, which blocked the use of the latest GOP-drawn districts in future elections and instructed a court-appointed special master to propose new lines for the state.
In their ruling, the judges expressed concern that Alabama lawmakers deliberately defied their order to create a second majority-Black district or a similar alternative. They were “deeply troubled” by the state’s enactment of a map that “does not provide the remedy we said federal law requires.”
The Alabama attorney general’s office has requested justices to temporarily halt the order while the state appeals, to prevent Alabama voters from being subjected to a court-ordered racial gerrymander. The attorney general’s office referenced a 1992 Supreme Court opinion on racial gerrymandering, stating that “race-based redistricting at the expense of traditional principles ‘bears an uncomfortable resemblance to political apartheid.'”
Alabama officials have asked the Supreme Court to issue a stay on the panel’s order no later than Oct. 3, which is when the district court plans to hold a hearing to select a new court-drawn map.
Eric Holder, the former U.S. Attorney General and chairman of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, which supported one of the court challenges in Alabama, likened the state’s actions to those of former segregationist Gov. George Wallace, who attempted to prevent Black students from entering the University of Alabama in 1963.
“This is a shameful and arrogant continuation of a sordid history in Alabama that denies equal rights to Black Alabamians, regardless of how the United States Supreme Court rules,” said Holder.
In June, the Supreme Court upheld a finding by a three-judge panel that Alabama’s prior map, which included only one majority-Black district out of seven in a state where 27% of the population is Black, likely violated Section 2 of the federal Voting Rights Act. The panel ruled that the state should have two districts where Black voters have the opportunity to elect their preferred candidates.
As a remedy, Alabama lawmakers hastily passed a new map in July. However, it still contained only one majority-Black district and increased the percentage of Black voters in District 2 from approximately 30% to nearly 40%. The panel reprimanded Alabama lawmakers for disregarding their instructions and directed a court-appointed special master to submit three proposed new maps by Sept. 25.
Alabama’s request to the Supreme Court comes after the three judges rejected their request to halt the order while the state appealed. The judges stated that state voters should not have to endure another congressional election under an “unlawful map.”
Alabama’s prospects of a favorable outcome potentially rest on Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who did not join in all aspects of the majority opinion in the previous round. The court filing repeatedly references Kavanaugh’s concurring opinion, in which he stated that even if race-based redistricting were allowed for a limited period under the Voting Rights Act, “the authority to conduct race-based redistricting cannot extend indefinitely into the future.”
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