A panel of federal judges on Tuesday rejected Alabama\u2019s effort to use a new voting map for the November midterm elections, saying that the districts discriminated against Black people and could not be used so shortly before a vote.<\/p>\n
Alabama\u2019s attorney general, Steve Marshall, announced in a court filing<\/a> Tuesday afternoon that he would immediately appeal to the Supreme Court, which last month ruled that a Louisiana congressional map drawn to create two majority-Black House districts was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. Gov. Kay Ivey, a Republican, has already set special primaries in August in four House districts that would be affected by her state\u2019s new congressional map.<\/p>\n The ruling further confuses the electoral landscape across the South, as Republican-led legislatures have raced to implement new district lines after the Supreme Court narrowed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. It also demonstrates how the ruling from the nation\u2019s highest court has further muddled how lower courts interpret the landmark civil rights law.<\/p>\n And in the seesaw battle over redistricting ahead of the midterms, Democrats seeking control of the House got a two wins on Tuesday, the ruling in Alabama, plus the decision by South Carolina state senators<\/a> to adjourn without drawing up a new map to eliminate that state\u2019s one majority-Black House seat. With thousands of votes already cast on the first day of South Carolina\u2019s early voting, there was no longer enough support among Republicans to push through new district lines before the state\u2019s June 9 primary.<\/p>\n If the Supreme Court takes up the Alabama case, it will be the first major test of the high court\u2019s new standard for challenging congressional maps. The lower court judges made clear that they had reviewed the arguments through the lens of the Supreme Court\u2019s Voting Rights Act<\/a> ruling last month but maintained that the state\u2019s map failed under the new standard by intentionally discriminating against Black voters. <\/p>\n \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 the panel of three judges wrote in a lengthy ruling. It also warned against causing voters additional confusion by trying to use a new map before the November elections. <\/p>\n The court, the panel wrote, was \u201cpainfully aware of the gravity of our ruling.\u201d But, it added, \u201cwe do not find the issue particularly complex or close.\u201d<\/p>\n The decision out of the Birmingham-based federal court was issued by Judge Stanley Marcus<\/a>, who was nominated to the bench by former President Bill Clinton; and by Judges Anna M. Manasco<\/a> and Terry F. Moorer<\/a>, both named to their posts by President Trump. (Judge Marcus typically sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta.)<\/p>\n Mr. Marshall, the attorney general, said he was \u201cdisappointed, but not at all surprised\u201d by the ruling. <\/p>\n \u201cKnow this,\u201d he added, \u201cin my mind, it is not a matter of whether we win this case, only when.\u201d<\/p>\n In the 79-page ruling, the judges said they faced a difficult choice. They could either greenlight a map they had already concluded was intentionally discriminatory, or they could block that map for the current election. <\/p>\n The judges wrote that they did \u201cnot lightly intrude in state affairs,\u201d but that their previous review had left them \u201cin no doubt\u201d that Alabama\u2019s map \u201cintentionally discriminated based on race in violation of the Constitution.\u201d<\/p>\n The panel explained that it had reviewed the case under the Supreme Court\u2019s updated standard, which appears to allow partisan gerrymandering but sets a high standard to challenge maps for race discrimination. <\/p>\n The judges wrote that the \u201cenormous record\u201d around the drawing of the districts \u201ccontains no evidence of a partisan motive.\u201d Their ruling, they wrote, marked a rejection \u201cin the strongest possible terms\u201d of Alabama\u2019s \u201cattempt to finish its intentional decision to dilute minority votes with a veneer of legislative regularity.\u201d<\/p>\n The decision also wrestles with two issues that have arisen in other states scrambling to redraw their maps in the middle of the primary season: the burden on election officials and the potential for significant voter confusion.<\/p>\n In tackling these two arguments, the court cited what is known as the Purcell principle, a doctrine that federal courts should generally avoid changing rules too close to an election to avoid voter confusion. When Alabama changed its maps recently, the court argued, voter confusion spiked.<\/p>\n Citing testimony from the Alabama director of elections, Jeff Elrod, the court said \u201cit will take a chaotic, decentralized, and herculean effort for officials in his office and fourteen counties to reassign voters\u201d to new districts. <\/p>\n While the decision was carefully tailored to apply only to specific questions about the redistricting procedures in Alabama, the whiplash in the state could ripple outward. State senators in South Carolina on Tuesday plan to continue to debate a new congressional map that could eliminate the last majority-Black district in the state, even as early voting begins. <\/p>\n Alabama has been tangled in litigation over its congressional map for years and had been barred from redistricting until after the 2030 census. Black voters have argued that the state has unfairly undercut their power at the ballot box. More than one in four residents of Alabama are Black.<\/p>\n