The Supreme Court on Tuesday allowed Alabama to use a contested congressional map in this year’s midterm elections, allowing the state to eliminate one of two majority-minority districts.

In an unsigned order, the conservative majority said a unanimous three-judge panel in the dispute failed to apply the updated standards resulting from the Callais decision.

“SCOTUS confirmed what I have said all along. Today’s decision is a win for the people of Alabama and our elections. Alabama is doing our part to keep America strong, and I am proud our state continues to fight the fight. I will see y’all at the polls August 11!” Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey said.

USA TODAY has more:

The map, passed by the GOP-controlled Legislature in 2023, has only one district with a significant Black population instead of the two districts that were included in a map the lower court had directed the state to use.

The Republican-preferred map, that three-judge panel said, was “tainted by intentional race-based discrimination.”

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“We conducted a searching review of extensive undisputed evidence from legislators and the Legislature and could not understand the 2023 Plan as anything other than an intentional effort to dilute votes based on race,” the panel wrote. “We concluded that if this record did not rebut the strong presumption of legislative good faith, we doubted the presumption is ever rebuttable.”

But the Supreme Court said the panel wrongly interpreted Alabama’s disagreement with the lower court’s initial ruling against the map as proof of discriminatory intent.

The majority also said the panel should not have blocked the map so close to an election because states “are free to decide for themselves whether last-minute changes to an election are in their best interests.”

“Just as Alabama doubled down on racial discrimination, the Court today doubles down on chaos,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a dissenting opinion.

“Because I choose to defend the rule of law and the right of all Alabamians to participate equally in democracy, I respectfully dissent,” she added.

ABC News shared further:

In 2024, Alabama had been required to use a map with two majority-Black districts, one of which was won by Democratic Rep. Shomari Figures.

The new map could allow Republicans to flip Figures’ seat.

The NAACP slammed the Supreme Court’s decision as discriminatory.

“The Supreme Court continues to unleash chaos in our democratic process, and with this latest action, gives Alabama approval to use a congressional map that had previously been found to be intentionally discriminatory,” NAACP General Counsel Kristen Clarke wrote in a statement. “This is a Court that is stripping Black voters of power and voice at a speed that would put Jim Crow jurists to shame. Our message to communities remains the same — the best way to express dissent is by showing up at the ballot box this election season.”

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