Read a PDF of our statement here.
A federal court has unanimously ordered that Alabama must continue to use an independently drawn congressional map for the rest of the decade. This court-ordered map includes two districts where Black voters have a fair opportunity to elect candidates of their choice. The map was used in the 2024 elections, and resulted in Alabama electing two Black representatives to Congress for the first time in history.
The court’s order bars Alabama from using a separate map drawn in 2023 by the state legislature. The court, however, declined to require Alabama to seek “preclearance” from the court or federal government before adopting a new map following the 2030 census.
The order yesterday follows a decision in May by the same federal court that unanimously ruled that the Alabama legislature’s 2023 congressional map was enacted with discriminatory intent in violation of the Constitution and the Voting Rights Act. In June, Alabama appealed this earlier decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.
“This win was long overdue and hard fought by Black voters in Alabama, our clients, and the entire team,” said Deuel Ross, director of litigation at the Legal Defense Fund. “By ordering the continued use of a fair map with two opportunity districts through 2030 – and retaining jurisdiction to step in if Alabama violates the law again – the court has ensured that Black Alabamians will have a real voice in choosing their elected representatives. We will continue to fight to protect this win and ensure that every voter in the state can participate fully, freely, and equally in the democratic process.”
“Our clients and many who came before them achieved Alabama’s current congressional map through many years of effort,” said Davin Rosborough, deputy director of the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project. “The Court’s agreement that this map should remain in place through 2030 marks an important victory in the battle for fair representation for Black Alabamians.”
The Plaintiffs—Evan Milligan, Shalela Dowdy, Letetia Jackson, Khadidah Stone, Greater Birmingham Ministries, and Alabama State Conference of the NAACP—issued the following joint statement: “Although the Court declined to restore preclearance review, we are excited that the Court ordered Alabama to continue using the special master map through 2030. This independently drawn map respects Alabama’s many communities of interest, including the Black Belt, and ensures that Black voters will continue to have a fair opportunity to elect congressional candidates of their choice. This is a hard-fought win for us, for all Alabamians, and for democracy itself. On the sixtieth anniversary of the Voting Rights Act and as states gear up for unnecessary mid-cycle redistricting, this decision sends a powerful message: the pernicious carving up of Black communities to dilute our political strength is unconstitutional.”
The court’s decision yesterday follows a series of legal challenges where a group of voters argued that Alabama’s congressional districts violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by diluting Black voting power. The Supreme Court agreed in a 2023 ruling that the plaintiffs were likely to prevail on that claim, and in its decision in Allen v. Milligan, mandated the creation of a second opportunity district for Black voters. Despite these previous decisions, Alabama insisted on a full trial of the case. In May, the Court once again ruled against Alabama and found that the Alabama legislature had intentionally discriminated against its Black citizens in enacting the state’s 2023 map. In yesterday’s order, the court identified the remedy related to its prior decision in May.
The case was originally brought in November 2021 on behalf of Evan Milligan, Khadidah Stone, Letetia Jackson, Shalela Dowdy, Greater Birmingham Ministries, and the Alabama State Conference of the NAACP who are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of Alabama, Legal Defense Fund, and Wiggins, Childs, Pantazis, Fisher & Goldfarb.
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Founded in 1940, the Legal Defense Fund (LDF) is the nation’s first civil rights law organization. LDF’s Thurgood Marshall Institute is a multi-disciplinary and collaborative hub within LDF that launches targeted campaigns and undertakes innovative research to shape the civil rights narrative. In media attributions, please refer to us as the Legal Defense Fund or LDF. Please note that LDF has been completely separate from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1957—although LDF was originally founded by the NAACP and shares its commitment to equal rights.
