In 2022, before the midterm elections, federal judges — some appointed by Trump — struck down Alabama’s congressional districting maps as racially motivated.
The Supreme Court temporarily reinstated those maps during the 2022 elections, but on June 8, 2023, ruled they violated the Voting Rights Act.
On its face, this decision affects only one district, and stands to give Alabama’s black voters 2 seats instead of just 1 — and Democrats 1 more seat — in the U.S. House of Representatives.
But if the ruling had been applied across the U.S. in time for the 2022 elections, “at least three, and as many as six, seats in the current House” likely would have been won by Democrats instead of Republicans, potentially enough for Democrats to have retained a House majority in 2022 (see story here).
In other words, a temporary Supreme Court hold on lower court rulings in favor of black voters arguably is responsible for the chaotic Republican clown show in the lower chamber of Congress that all Americans have to live with for 2 years, and which nearly tanked the economy because of House Republicans’ debt ceiling shenanigans.
The Supreme Court justices are among the federal employees who wouldn’t have been paid if that near-disaster hadn’t been averted at the last minute. Perhaps this has entered their minds. They’re surely aware the debt ceiling crisis was an artificial crisis manufactured by the House GOP majority they put in power, and more Democrats than Republicans voted for the compromise that prevented a financial meltdown.
The court’s 5-4 decision was a surprise (see story here), with Roberts — no friend of voting rights — and Kavanaugh joining the liberal justices to strike down Alabama’s blatant racial gerrymandering. Maybe they looked at what they had wrought, and what it nearly caused, and then had second thoughts and some regrets?
After all, if Alabama’s racial gerrymandering is illegal in 2023, then it was illegal in 2022, too, because the law hasn’t changed. In retrospect, the “hold” on the lower court rulings has the appearance of a political move to benefit the Republican Party. And this Court is already widely viewed as a political court, rather than one making decisions based on law.
Public confidence in the Court is plunging. There are rumblings in Congress. Against that landscape, I wonder if Roberts originally intended to uphold the Alabama gerrymandering, then on reflection considered it just might be a bridge too far for a Court already under siege.