The Supreme Court has ordered that congressional voting maps be redrawn in Alabama in order to allow a Black majority district.
The ruling came Thursday after an intense battle over the proposed Republican-drawn Alabama map – which would have limited the voting power of Black voters and largely favored Republicans.
The court’s 5-4 vote means the map of the seven congressional districts must now be redrawn. Conservative Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh joined the court’s three liberal judges in the majority.
For voting rights supporters, the vote lessened concerns, for now, that the court’s ruling would make it tougher for minorities to challenge maps under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.
Democratic Alabama senator Doug Jones, who has been outspoken on the maps issue, took to his Twitter to comment on the court’s decision.
Black Women Voters in Alabama
The Supreme Court ruling ultimately reignited conversations around the work of Black women to get Jones into the Senate back in 2017 — which was the first time in 25 years Alabama elected a Democrat to the Senate.
NBC News exit polls showed that 96 percent of black voters supported Jones, with 98 percent of black women and 93 percent of black men backing him.
Speaking to NBC following Jones’ win, DeJuana Thompson, co-founder of strategy firm Think Rubix, said that Black women stepped in to support Jones as an act of protection for their community.
“When you have rhetoric coming out about possible pedophilia, and when you’ve got rhetoric coming out about slashing critical resources to education and the programs that help sustain homes in the African-American community, black women are always going to show up for their communities,” Thompson said. “When black women show up for their community, every other community is empowered.”
Black women voting rights activist in Alabama have remained key in pushing Jones, the White House, and representatives to be vocal about the attempts to suppress Black voting power in Alabama and other states. Following the Supreme Court ruling, there is a continued call to address voter suppression, which has been especially routine the southern states.
Speaking on the ruling, Alabama’s Democratic Rep. Terri Sewell, the state’s first Black woman elected to Congress, stressed that the decision will allow for more “equitable maps” in Alabama.
“I’m so happy that the justices saw the truth in the fact that that represents voter dilution and it’s black voter dilution,” Sewell said on CNN’s News Central on Thursday.
“Everyone’s looking at this decision and I think that it will have a ripple effect, a positive ripple effect. It means that minority dilution is not going to be tolerated by the Supreme Court or by any court in the land and that is a huge victory,” Sewell added.