The Supreme Court’s bombshell ruling striking down racial gerrymandering under the Voting Rights Act sent shockwaves through the political landscape this week — and Southern Republican governors wasted no time acting on it. For Democrats, who have spent years leaning on race-based district engineering to protect their congressional seats, the timing couldn’t be worse.
Alabama and Tennessee both called special legislative sessions on Friday to redraw their congressional maps, and the dominoes are already starting to fall across the South.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey moved quickly, calling lawmakers into special session and signaling she wants the state ready to hold new primary elections if the courts move fast enough to allow it. Right now, Alabama’s May 19 primaries are set to proceed using a court-ordered map that artificially packs black voters into two districts — a map the Supreme Court’s ruling makes unconstitutional. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall filed an emergency motion Friday asking the court for a quick answer on whether the state can revert to its previously drawn map, which has just one majority-black district and would almost certainly deliver an additional Republican seat in Congress.
“By calling the Legislature into a special session, I am ensuring Alabama is prepared should the courts act quickly enough to allow Alabama’s previously drawn congressional and state Senate maps to be used during this election cycle,” Ivey said Friday afternoon.
Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee followed suit, calling his own special session to review the state’s congressional map. The current map includes a single Democratic-controlled district anchored in Memphis, and Lee’s office has warned that “any change to Tennessee’s congressional map must be enacted as soon as possible,” ahead of the August 6 primary.
It’s not hard to read the tea leaves on where this is headed.
Hellbound and Down 