The Supreme Court on Tuesday issued a 6-3 order allowing Alabama to use a congressional redistricting map that eliminates one of the state's two majority-Black districts for the 2026 elections. The decision, divided along ideological lines, lifted a lower-court injunction that had blocked the map on the grounds that it was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.
The legal dispute followed a 2023 map devised by Alabama's Republican-led legislature. While a three-judge panel repeatedly found the map intentionally diluted the power of Black voters in violation of the 14th Amendment and the Voting Rights Act, the Supreme Court majority stated the lower court did not properly defer to the state’s "partisan interests" or the "presumption of legislative good faith." Alabama officials argued the map was designed to keep the Gulf Coast in a single district and to avoid forcing Republican incumbents to run against one another.
In a separate ruling on Friday, the Supreme Court blocked a new map in Missouri that had been drawn by that state's legislature to give Republicans an additional House seat. The court noted that because voting for the November 3 general election had already begun in Missouri, changing the maps at this stage would cause "electoral chaos." In Alabama, however, the court found the lower court erred by interfering with the state's own choice of maps so close to an election.
For residents in Missouri, the court’s decision to block a 2025 map means the November 3 election will proceed using 2022 district lines. Had the 2025 map been reinstated, it would have affected hundreds of thousands of voters who already cast ballots in the primary under the new lines, and would have split the Kansas City area to make Rep. Emanuel Cleaver’s (D-MO) district more conservative. Missouri officials stated that reverting to the 2025 map during an ongoing election was "practically impossible" due to the cost and time required to reprint and distribute ballots to military and overseas voters.
These rulings set a precedent for how the "Purcell principle"—a legal doctrine suggesting courts should avoid changing election rules close to an election—is applied. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in her dissent, argued the court is now allowing states to make late-stage changes while preventing courts from correcting potential constitutional violations. This decision follows a broader shift after an April Supreme Court ruling that narrowed the Voting Rights Act, a move that has already seen Louisiana and Tennessee move to dismantle majority-Black or Democratic-leaning districts. Alabama will now proceed with its August 11 primaries under the 6-1 Republican-leaning map.