For decades, Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, first passed in 1965 by President Lyndon B. Johnson, has protected the interests and representation of minority groups across the country. More specifically, it protected the representation in Congress of black Americans across the Deep South. In simple words, Section 2 banned voting laws, practices, and redistricting maps that discriminated against minority voters based on race or language. It was historically used to block racial gerrymandering and to require the creation of minority-majority districts, especially in states like Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Louisiana, where black Americans make up a significant portion of their state’s population.
On April 29, 2026, the Supreme Court delivered its decision on Louisiana v. Callais, a case that argued that the Congressional map the state of Louisiana used in the 2024 elections, which had 2 majority black districts, was a racial gerrymander that disenfranchised white voters living in the 2nd and 6th districts. In a 6-3 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that Louisiana’s map was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.
In his majority opinion, Justice Samuel Alito wrote that “the Voting Rights Act did not require Louisiana to create an additional majority-minority district.” Alito added that the case confronted a “long-unresolved question whether compliance with the Voting Rights Act provides a compelling reason that may justify the intentional use of race in drawing legislative districts.”
AP US Government and Politics and Academic Seminar teacher Nicholas Kintzle commented on the decision from the Supreme Court. He explained that “race is not the predominant factor anymore [when it comes to drawing districts,] because the Constitution is colorblind according to Alito’s opinion,” Kintzle said. “Now, if a person in Louisiana or any southern state believes that their voting rights under Section 2 have been violated, they have to essentially prove that the intent of the state is to discriminate against them based on race, which is almost impossible to do.”
Though not fully eliminated, Kintzle explained that Section 2 has been made toothless.
“Basically, Section 2 is now muted,” Kintzle said. “The only thing that is left is the protection against racial gerrymander, but now you have to prove meaning instead of intent.”
According to Kintzle, having to prove meaning will be much harder, almost impossible to do.
With the midterm elections quickly approaching this November, southern states that had previously been forced by Section 2 to have majority-black districts like Alabama, Tennessee, and South Carolina have quickly passed new maps that break up these black populations. The most notable of these is Tennessee, where the Republican-controlled legislature passed a map that split the majority-black city of Memphis into three separate majority-white districts. These mid-decade redistricting attempts have drawn criticism from democrats who claim republicans are trying to minimize their losses in the midterms by drawing unfair maps.
Kintzle said that these new maps will only affect the midterms, depending on how many states actually redraw their maps. “On the short hand, probably not much. Maybe like 4-5 [new] seats for republicans,” explained Kintzle. “If all the southern states do it, that number could grow.”
However, Kintzle said that republicans still have the burden of unpopularity weighing them down. “This may not be the huge advantage they think it is this coming November because of how unpopular they are.”
Lastly, one thing to look out for is democratic attempts to retaliate by drawing gerrymandered maps in Democratic-controlled states. A new map passed by California voters will give Democrats a new 48-4 map, and a failed attempt in Virginia would’ve netted them four additional seats.
“The bigger part is that it won’t just be the south,” said Kintzle. “It will kick off a cutthroat amount of nationwide gerrymandering that will be ruthless gerrymandering nationally.”
Out of the 44 states in the country that have more than one congressional district, 10 of those have redrawn their maps since the 2024 elections. 8 of those new maps favor republicans, 2 of them favor democrats.
With more and more states threatening to redraw their maps and no national gerrymandering ban in sight, this Supreme Court decision has just made the fight for fair districts a much more complicated one.
