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A federal three-judge panel ruled that Alabama's congressional map, adopted three years ago, was a product of intentional racial discrimination.
In 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed by a 5-to-4 vote a lower court's finding that Alabama had violated the Voting Rights Act.
Following a court order, a special master created a new congressional map for Alabama which resulted in the election of two Black representatives in 2024 for the first time since Reconstruction.
The Supreme Court's decision in the Louisiana versus Calais case has made it significantly more difficult for vote dilution claims under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act to be successful.
A three-judge federal panel, consisting of two Trump appointees and one Clinton appointee, found Alabama's 2023 legislative map to be unconstitutional and in violation of the Voting Rights Act, even under the new Calais standard.
Carrie Cullenese expects the Supreme Court to overturn the decades-long precedent from the Humphrey's Executor case, which allows Congress to create independent agencies whose heads cannot be removed at will by the president.
The Supreme Court case Trump v. Slaughter is directly challenging the 1930s precedent set in Humphrey's Executor regarding the president's ability to remove heads of independent agencies.
The Supreme Court case Trump v. Cook concerns the president's attempt to remove Federal Reserve Board of Governors member Lisa Cook and will clarify what constitutes "good cause" for removing an official protected from at-will removal.
As of 2020, Alabama's congressional map consisted of six white-majority districts and one Black-majority district, despite the state's population being approximately 30% Black.
The Alabama legislature passed a new congressional map in 2023 that is expected to result in six Republican representatives and one Democratic representative.
Richard Brafault suggests the Supreme Court might stay the lower court's injunction on Alabama's 2023 voting map, allowing it to be used for the upcoming election, and then hear the case on its merits next year.
In South Carolina, five Republican state senators joined Democrats to adjourn without drawing a new congressional map, effectively blocking the elimination of the state's one majority-Black House seat.