As much as 30% of the Congressional Black Caucus and 11% of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus could also be lost.
“This racial gerrymandering has the ability to not just disempower, disenfranchise Black voters and to eliminate Black elected officials and Latino elected officials.
Two years ago, the Supreme Court rejected a similar argument by Alabama Republicans.
But the timing remains unclear for the Supreme Court, which usually releases decisions for major cases toward the end of its term in June.
Republican state officials in Mississippi have also raised that issue in another redistricting case on direct appeal to the high court.
A significant redistricting case is coming back to the United States. S. On Wednesday, the Supreme Court could decide not only how the federal Voting Rights Act would be handled, but also open the door for Republicans to win a number of more congressional seats.
The voting rights advocacy organizations Black Voters Matter Fund and Fair Fight Action recently released a report indicating that GOP-controlled states could redraw at least 19 more House of Representatives voting districts in favor of Republicans if the high court overturns the act’s Section 2, which prohibits racial discrimination in voting.
Additionally, based on when the court renders a decision in Louisiana v. A few of the seats might be redrawn before the midterm elections the following year, Callais.
President Trump is spearheading a GOP push for new maps in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, and other states, which could help Republicans maintain their narrow House majority following the 2026 election, according to the analysis.
The Supreme Court’s decision to strike down long-standing Section 2 protections against the diluting of the collective power of racial minority voters could help the GOP effort.
After the conservative-majority court postponed making a decision in the Louisiana case last term and instead decided to hold a rare second round of oral arguments, which is anticipated to center on whether Section 2’s redistricting requirements are constitutional, many supporters of the historic law are afraid of such a result.
In primarily Southern states where Republicans either hold a veto-proof majority in the legislature or control both legislative chambers and the governor’s office, and where voting is racially polarized, with Black voters typically voting Democratic and white voters typically voting Republican, a decision that guts Section 2 could have a cascading effect on congressional maps.
There may be fewer Democratic representatives in Congress in Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, Missouri, North Carolina, and Texas if mapmakers in those states are not obligated by Section 2 to create districts where voters of racial minorities have a reasonable chance of electing their preferred candidate. According to the report, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, and South Carolina may lose all of theirs.
It could also result in the loss of up to 11 percent of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and 30 percent of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Cliff Albright, co-founder and executive director of Black Voters Matter Fund, says it all points to the potential for Republicans to solidify one-party control of the House for at least a generation.
“What happens in the South doesn’t just stay in the South,” Albright continues, “and that’s part of the point we’re trying to make with this report.”. Racial gerrymandering has the potential to disenfranchise Black voters, disempower Black elected officials, and disempower Latino elected officials. Everything that occurs in these states affects the entire nation. “.
The potential for a “free-for-all” redistricting process if the Supreme Court overturns Section 2.
In the Louisiana case, a group of Black voters filed a Section 2 lawsuit, and a lower court ordered the Republican-controlled legislature to create a new congressional map.
Section 2 “ensures all communities of color can still participate equally in the voting process and elect candidates who reflect their interests,” according to Alanah Odoms, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, whose lawyers are assisting in the representation of those voters who are Black. And if communities of color can’t do that, we risk losing what I think most of us consider to be so essential to our democracy: equal opportunity and participation. “,”.
With the implementation of the court-ordered map for the 2024 election, Democrats were able to gain a second seat in Louisiana.
But Phillip Callais and a group of self-described “non-African American” voters have claimed that the court’s order to redistrict based on race in order to comply with Section 2 is unconstitutional. They contend that the Supreme Court should abolish race-based political mapmaking under Section 2 in the same way that it rejected racial affirmative action at colleges and universities in 2023.
In the Louisiana case, the Supreme Court requested a rehearing, asking all parties to contemplate whether the state’s “intentional creation of a second majority-minority congressional district violates the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.”. A. the Constitution. “.
In a recent brief to the high court, Republican state officials in Louisiana now argue that race should not be used “in any form” in redistricting.
Furthermore, the Justice Department under Trump concurs that the protections against racial discrimination under Section 2 are no longer constitutional, which is a significant departure from previous administrations.
Alabama Republicans made a similar argument two years ago, but the Supreme Court dismissed it.
“The Voting Rights Act could be upheld by the court, as it did in Allen v. Atiba Ellis, an associate dean and professor at the law school at Case Western Reserve University, says of Milligan. “However, a lot of people, including myself, have been worried about the court growing increasingly doubtful of racial remedies to correct historical civil rights injustices. Additionally, the court may rule that this ruling is unconstitutional or severely limit Congress’s ability to enact remedies that support multiracial democracy. “.”.
Ellis adds that such a decision, which comes amid the ongoing battle between Republicans and Democrats over congressional redistricting in the middle of the decade, could pave the way for a real “free-for-all”—citing the court’s 2019 decision that federal courts cannot review partisan gerrymandering.
“Using their positions of authority to engage in unprecedented power grabs is one thing for politicians on both sides of the aisle. However, the prevention of racial discrimination has been the most significant check on those grabs,” Ellis says in reference to Section 2. “I believe that if there is no federal legislation to stop that discrimination, the repercussions could be severe and last for decades. “..”.
The closer state deadlines get, the less time there is to pass new congressional maps before the midterm elections. To avoid interfering with the state’s current schedule, Louisiana’s top election official, Secretary of State Nancy Landry, has requested that the Supreme Court render a decision in this case by early January 2026.
However, the timing is still uncertain for the Supreme Court, which typically issues rulings in significant cases in June, near the end of its term.
The court confirmed that it will consider whether to take up a case in North Dakota regarding the continued ability of private individuals and groups, whose lawsuits have been the primary means of enforcing Section 2, to file lawsuits early next month. That is another redistricting case that has been directly appealed to the high court by Republican state officials in Mississippi.
