WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that South Carolina Republicans illegally failed to consider race when they drew congressional districts in a way that excluded thousands of black voters, a decision that will make it harder for civil rights plaintiffs to bring racial gerrymandering lawsuits.
The Supreme Court was split 6-3 ideologically with a conservative majority, but lawmakers weighed in on racial issues in drawing the Charleston-area district currently represented by Republican U.S. Rep. Nancy Mace. He said civil rights groups had not done enough to demonstrate what they were focusing on.
While the Supreme Court has been hearing the case much more slowly than expected, the lower court that invalidated the maps has ruled that they can be used in this year’s election.
So while the judge’s ruling doesn’t have an immediate impact on South Carolina, it does set a ground rule for future redistricting efforts. The decision makes it easier to draw maps that disadvantage black voters, so long as mapmakers can show they’re focusing on politics, not race.
In the South, black voters tend to be Democrats, so it can be hard to separate race from politics.
Leah Aden, a lawyer for the civil rights group Legal Defense Fund, which represented the plaintiffs before the Supreme Court, said the decision was “disappointing not only for our case but for other cases” because the court denied reliance on evidence that had previously been available.
“Bars continue to move, making it increasingly difficult for plaintiffs to eradicate racism,” she added.
The court sided with Republican state officials, who argued that their sole goal was to increase the district’s Republican tilt.
South Carolina Senate President Thomas Alexander welcomed the ruling, saying the redistricting plan was “meticulously crafted to comply with statutory and constitutional requirements.”
As a result of the ruling, Mace’s district will not have to be redrawn, a blow to Democrats hoping to secure more favorable maps. The lawsuit based on other claims brought by the plaintiffs against the map may continue.
Conservative Justice Samuel Alito, writing the majority opinion, wrote that there was “no direct evidence” to support the lower court’s ruling that race was a significant consideration in drawing the maps.
He added that the “circumstantial evidence goes far beyond showing that race, rather than partisan preferences, drove the redistricting process.”
Alito added that state legislatures should be given the benefit of the doubt when faced with claims that the maps were drawn with discriminatory intent.
“We should not be so quick to hurl such accusations at the political branch,” he wrote.
Liberal Justice Elena Kagan wrote in dissent that the majority had “given the best efforts” to defeat the challengers. He said evidence about the impact on Black voters could be easily circumvented if the state could present an alternative narrative that claims the electorate is divided based on partisan interests.
“This is a great message to send to state legislators and map makers about racial redistricting,” she added.
The message to politicians “who may want to straight up suppress minority voters’ influence on elections” is: “Go ahead,” Kagan said.
The Supreme Court was considering a lower court ruling from January 2023 that found race was a primary concern in drawing one of the state’s seven congressional districts.
Republicans redrawn the boundaries after the 2020 Census to strengthen Republican control of the battleground districts.
Democrat Joe Cunningham won the seat in 2018 and narrowly lost to Mace in 2020. Two years later, new districting took place and Mace won by a larger margin.
Approximately 30,000 black voters were transferred from this district to a district controlled by Democratic Congressman James Clyburn, who is black. This district is the only one of seven Congressional districts that is controlled by Democrats.
Civil rights groups argued that Republicans not only illegally took race into account when drawing maps, but also weakened the power of black voters. The latter claim remains unresolved, and lawyers for the plaintiffs said Thursday they have not yet decided how to proceed..
The allegation of illegal redistricting was brought under the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, which states that the law applies equally to all people. The lawsuit was filed on a different legal theory than last year’s landmark ruling in which civil rights activists challenged the Alabama Republican Party’s redistricting maps under the Voting Rights Act.
Even before Thursday’s ruling, it was already difficult to challenge congressional district maps, and not just on race-based grounds.
In a 2019 case on a related issue, the Supreme Court made it impossible for plaintiffs to challenge districts in federal court, calling them partisan gerrymandering designed to strengthen the political power of incumbent politicians. . Congress could enact legislation imposing rules on redistricting, but it would likely happen soon because Republicans oppose it.
