Why the voting rights ruling could hurt Democrats in the South

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The Supreme Court’s ruling further curtailing the Voting Rights Act (VRA) could spell trouble for Democrats’ congressional representation in the South.

The court’s 6-3 decision Wednesday only directly strikes down the current congressional map for Louisiana, which had sued to protest the second Black-majority congressional district the state had been required to draw. But it could have wide-ranging implications for other Black-majority districts throughout the South that have been safeguarded by the VRA’s voting rights protections.

Republicans across the South almost immediately began agitating to redraw their congressional maps due to the decision, opening a new chapter in a gerrymandering fight that has already defined this midterm cycle.

The ruling didn’t strike down Section 2 of the VRA, which prevents election practices that deny equal access to the political process based on race, as many liberals and civil rights advocates feared, but it could significantly rein in the provision’s usage. Justice Elena Kagan declared in her fiery dissent that the court has conducted a “now-completed demolition” of the VRA.

“I dissent because the Court betrays its duty to faithfully implement the great statute Congress wrote. I dissent because the Court’s decision will set back the foundational right Congress granted of racial equality in electoral opportunity,” she said.

Although Louisiana was the only state suing in the case, other states in the South and elsewhere have previously drawn majority-minority districts to comply with the VRA. Those districts are now at particularly risk of being broken up by Republicans.

While it’s too late in the 2026 calendar for many states to make changes before the midterms, Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry (R) appears anxious to try.

The Washington Post reported Landry told Republican House candidates he plans to suspend the state’s primaries, currently scheduled for just more than two weeks away, to allow state lawmakers to approve a new map first.

One state where the effects may also be more immediate is Florida, where state legislators sent a new congressional map to Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Wednesday. The map could allow Republicans to net up to four currently Democratic-held seats in November.

The Florida state constitution has clear anti-partisan gerrymandering language, but DeSantis’s legal team is arguing the VRA ruling would also invalidate that text. A legal battle is almost certain to follow once DeSantis signs the map into effect.

Zachary Donnini, the head of data science for the political media organization VoteHub, told Morning Report that he expects much more litigation and rulings related to the VRA to come, including from the Supreme Court.

“This isn’t going to be the last time that the Supreme Court has a kind of landmark ruling on Section 2 in the VRA in the next probably five years,” he said.

“I think that [Justice Samuel Alito’s] wording and how Kagan is reacting in the dissent makes me think it’s more likely than not that Republicans in the South, if they decide to at the state level, will be able to draw out a lot of these seats,” Donnini said. “That being said, it is not anywhere close to decided.”

Donnini said a second Black-majority district in Alabama, which was created in 2023 after the Supreme Court found a previous map likely violated the VRA, is directly at risk because of the latest ruling.

That could eventually cost both Reps. Cleo Fields (D-La.) and Shomari Figures (D-Ala.) their seats in Congress.

Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), who is running for governor of Tennessee, called on state lawmakers to redraw the state’s congressional lines to create a new map entirely favoring Republicans. That would target Rep. Steve Cohen, the lone Democrat in Tennessee’s delegation.

Republicans running for governor of Georgia called on state lawmakers to enact a new map.

Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey (R) declined to call a special session of the state Legislature to redraw the state’s lines, noting that litigation surrounding its congressional districts is currently pending.

The fate is unclear for other majority-minority districts in the southern, such as those currently represented by Democratic Reps. Bennie Thompson in Mississippi and James Clyburn in South Carolina, Donnini said.

If Republicans do target Democratic-held seats in the South, Democrats are already signaling they’re prepared to fight back.

Rep. Terri Sewell, the other Democrat in Alabama’s congressional delegation, said at a press conference that Democrats in solidly blue states should respond with their own redistricting to take every possible seat.

“I can’t speak for my chairwoman, but I’d take 52 seats from California and 17 seats from Illinois,” she said. 

That would echo the tit-for-tat national redistricting battle that has played out for the past year, which now looks like the prologue for an even bigger battle heading into 2028.

▪ The Hill: National redistricting war........

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