Gov. Kay Ivey moved swiftly Tuesday to call special elections in August for U.S. Congress and State Senate districts as drawn by lawmakers before being overridden by federal courts.
But plaintiffs in Milligan, the case that led to the court-drawn maps, have filed a motion for a temporary restraining order to continue using the maps drawn by the courts to remedy racial discrimination in the state-drawn maps.
“The Supreme Court’s action is the latest in a pattern of decisions that undermine the rights of Black voters. The court’s decision is designed to entrench power in the hands of the few at the expense of Black voters who have been denied equal rights at every turn,” the Milligan plaintiffs said in a joint statement Tuesday. “It also flies in the face of the decision it issued in this case less than three years ago. This order is also contrary to longstanding precedent that has, until yesterday, forbidden changing the rules too close to an election. With voting already underway, the court has created chaos for Alabama election officials and voters.
“In 2023, the Alabama Legislature intentionally sought to deny Black voters fair representation in government. Permitting Alabama to use, for the very first time, the 2023 map in elections when voters have already legally cast ballots is an affront to the very ideals of democracy. The Supreme Court’s order rushes to displace the remedial map approved by the district court, and paves the way for Alabama to implement an extreme gerrymandered map that violates the Constitution and the Voting Rights Act.”
In 2021, Milligan plaintiffs challenged a 2021 Alabama congressional map that unlawfully diluted Black political power. In 2023, the Supreme Court affirmed a lower court’s ruling striking down the 2021 map. That same year, the Alabama Legislature drew another map. After weeks of trial, the district court ruled that Alabama’s 2023 map had a discriminatory result in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and that the Legislature had intentionally discriminated against Black voters in violation of the U.S. Constitution. The court struck down the 2023 map and ordered the use of Alabama’s current court-drawn congressional map. This map was used in the 2024 election, and voters have already cast ballots with it in Alabama’s ongoing 2026 primary elections.
The National Redistricting Foundation lent its support to the motion Tuesday.
“Ballots have already been cast in the state’s May 19 congressional primary elections on a map that includes two majority Black districts, and yet the state of Alabama is feverishly rushing to toss out the results of that ongoing election to impose a gerrymander that intentionally diminishes the voting power of Black Alabamians,” said Marina Jenkins, executive director of the NRF. “In doing so, the state is giving itself the power to determine whose votes count and whose do not, and this poses a real threat to the right to vote for all Alabamians. The court must act quickly to stop the unbridled chaos the state of Alabama is causing for its voters and allow the ongoing election to proceed on the existing map, on which ballots have already been cast.”
