The conservative majority on the Supreme Court has been working to address the concerns for years Voting Rights Act. The majority’s 6-3 ruling, which took the teeth out of Section 2 of the law, was no surprise. Actually, this was the expected decision.
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The knee-jerk reaction is that Democrats need to pass new voting rights legislation, but at some point a new bill will end up before the conservative Supreme Court, meaning the country could find itself in the same situation again in a few years.
However, the court did not rule that Section 2 is unconstitutional, opening the door to gerrymandering based on partisanship, not race.
House Judiciary Committee member Jamie Raskin responded to the Supreme Court’s decision and proposed a solution.
Raskin said in a statement:
The Supreme Court has completed the effective dismantling of the Voting Rights Act. The VRA was the crown jewel of the 20th century civil rights movement, born from the blood of protesters and freedom riders and repeatedly reauthorized by bipartisan majorities in Congress. In an act of extraordinary and cynical judicial activism, six justices have now overturned Congress’s express objectives by rewriting and effectively neutralizing Section 2 of the VRA by requiring the standard of proof to establish a VRA claim—a showing of intentional racial discrimination—that Congress explicitly rejected in 1982.
The Court has now completed the work it began by striking down Section 5’s preclearance protections in Shelby County v. Holder. That project is an embarrassment to the federal judiciary and a permanent stain on the legacy of this Court. Combined with the Court’s 2019 ruling in Rucho v. Common Cause, which bars federal courts from overseeing partisan gerrymandering, today’s ruling is a catastrophe for American democracy. Partisan gerrymanders are now untouchable, as are racial vote dilution schemes that exclude minority voters from the political process so long as they are conveniently redesignated as partisan gerrymanders. Republican legislatures in the South are already preparing to carve out and eliminate majority-minority districts at every level of government. The Court has made the world safe for these heinous and racist gerrymanders. This moment resembles the end of political reconstruction in the 19th century.
The gist of the Roberts Court is that the deliberate inclusion of an African American or Latinx majority district to promote fair representation is a presumptively unconstitutional “racial gerrymander,” while the deliberate destruction of an African American or Latinx majority district is perfectly legal if the stated purpose is the expansion and entrenchment of a “partisan gerrymander.” This is a colossal defeat for American democracy.
I call for Congress to establish nonpartisan, independent redistricting commissions across the country to take map-drawing out of the hands of politicians once and for all, and for Congress to allow multi-member congressional districts with proportional representation systems to prevent partisan lockouts and drownings across the country. Congress must act now to pull the country out of the abyss of constitutional double standards and partisan authoritarianism.
A national ban on gerrymandering is the answer. All congressional districts should be drawn by independent commissions.
Remember, the court’s standard is partisan gerrymandering, which is allowed under this ruling, but if Congress bans partisan gerrymander, the new law will suit the Supreme Court because the conservative majority will have left itself out.
Democrats can continue to play games with voting rights legislation that ends up in the courts, or they can aim bigger and strengthen democracy by banning gerrymandering once they gain control of Congress and the White House.
It is time for Democrats to take action and make a major commitment to protecting voting rights.
