{"id":8531,"date":"2022-08-05T12:46:49","date_gmt":"2022-08-05T12:46:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=8531"},"modified":"2022-08-05T12:46:49","modified_gmt":"2022-08-05T12:46:49","slug":"the-supreme-court-just-handed-down-very-bad-news-for-black-voters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=8531","title":{"rendered":"The Supreme Court just handed down very bad news for Black voters"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“The Supreme Court handed down a brief order<\/a> Tuesday evening that effectively reinstates racially gerrymandered congressional maps in the state of Louisiana, at least for the 2022 election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under these maps, Black voters will control just one of Louisiana\u2019s six congressional seats, despite the fact that African Americans make up nearly a third of the state\u2019s population<\/a>. Thus, the Court\u2019s decision in Ardoin v. Robinson<\/em> means that Black people will have half as much congressional representation as they would enjoy under maps where Black voters have as much opportunity to elect their own preferred candidate as white people in Louisiana.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A federal trial court, applying longstanding Supreme Court precedents holding that the Voting Rights Act does not permit such racial gerrymanders, issued a preliminary injunction temporarily striking down the Louisiana maps and ordering the state legislature to draw new ones that include two Black-majority districts<\/a>. Notably, a very conservative panel<\/a> of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit denied the state\u2019s request to stay the trial court\u2019s decision \u2014 a sign that Louisiana\u2019s maps were such a clear violation of the Voting Rights Act that even one of the most conservative appeals courts in the country could not find a good reason to disturb the trial court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the Fifth Circuit explained, current law typically forbids maps that dilute a particular racial group\u2019s voting power<\/a>, at least when that group is \u201csufficiently large and compact to form a majority\u201d in additional congressional districts, when it \u201cvotes cohesively\u201d and when \u201cwhites tend to vote as a bloc\u201d to defeat the minority group\u2019s preferred candidates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nevertheless, the Supreme Court voted 6-3 along party lines to stay the trial court\u2019s injunction, effectively reinstating the gerrymandered maps. The Court\u2019s order is only one page<\/a>, and it provides no substantive explanation of why the Court\u2019s Republican appointees voted to effectively strip Black Louisianans of half of their representation in the US House of Representatives.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Taken together, the Court\u2019s orders in Merrill<\/em>, Ardoin<\/em>, and the Wisconsin case suggest that the justices are skeptical of current rules, which provide fairly robust protections against racial gerrymandering, and plan to replace those rules with a new regime that is likely less friendly to Black voters \u2014 and most likely to minority voters generally. None of these three orders was particularly well explained, but the pattern is that, in each case, the Court ruled against efforts to draw maps that expand Black political power.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.vox.com\/23187117\/supreme-court-louisiana-racial-gerrymander-ardoin-robinson-congressional-maps<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“The Supreme Court handed down a brief order Tuesday evening that effectively reinstates racially gerrymandered congressional maps in the state of Louisiana, at least for the 2022 election.<\/p>\n

Under these maps, Black voters will control just one of Louisiana\u2019s six congressional seats, despite the fact that African Americans make up nearly a third of the state\u2019s population. Thus, the Court\u2019s decision in Ardoin v. Robinson means that Black people will have half as much congressional representation as they would enjoy under maps where Black voters have as much opportunity to elect their own preferred candidate as white people in Louisiana.<\/p>\n

A federal trial court, applying longstanding Supreme Court precedents holding that the Voting Rights Act does not permit such racial gerrymanders, issued a preliminary injunction temporarily striking down the Louisiana maps and ordering the state legislature to draw new ones that include two Black-majority districts. Notably, a very conservative panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit denied the state\u2019s request to stay the trial court\u2019s decision \u2014 a sign that Louisiana\u2019s maps were such a clear violation of the Voting Rights Act that even one of the most conservative appeals courts in the country could not find a good reason to disturb the trial court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n

As the Fifth Circuit explained, current law typically forbids maps that dilute a particular racial group\u2019s voting power, at least when that group is \u201csufficiently large and compact to form a majority\u201d in additional congressional districts, when it \u201cvotes cohesively\u201d and when \u201cwhites tend to vote as a bloc\u201d to defeat the minority group\u2019s preferred candidates.<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, the Supreme Court voted 6-3 along party lines to stay the trial court\u2019s injunction, effectively reinstating the gerrymandered maps. The Court\u2019s order is only one page, and it provides no substantive explanation of why the Court\u2019s Republican appointees voted to effectively strip Black Louisianans of half of their representation in the US House of Representatives.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“Taken together, the Court\u2019s orders in Merrill, Ardoin, and the Wisconsin case suggest that the justices are skeptical of current rules, which provide fairly robust protections against racial gerrymandering, and plan to replace those rules with a new regime that is likely less friendly to Black voters \u2014 and most likely to minority voters generally. None of these three orders was particularly well explained, but the pattern is that, in each case, the Court ruled against efforts to draw maps that expand Black political power.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[56,1500,198,1606,642,528,479],"class_list":["post-8531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-black","tag-blacks","tag-elections","tag-gerrymander","tag-race","tag-supreme-court","tag-voting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8531"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8531\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8532,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8531\/revisions\/8532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}