On Monday, May 11, the Supreme Court's conservative majority cleared the way for Alabama to revert to a congressional map with only one majority-Black district — eliminating the second district that federal courts had ordered the state to create in 2023. The unsigned order came with no explanation, no oral argument, and no majority opinion. It arrived eight days before Alabama's scheduled primary election.
The seat in the crosshairs is Alabama's 2nd Congressional District, currently held by Democratic Rep. Shomari Figures — the Black congressman whose 2024 election was the direct product of the court order that SCOTUS just threw out.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Kagan and Jackson, dissented. Her words were pointed: the order was "inappropriate" and "will cause only confusion as Alabamians begin to vote in the elections scheduled for next week." The conservative majority, she wrote, "unceremoniously discards" the lower court's finding that Alabama engaged in intentional racial discrimination.
How We Got Here
What This Means for the Midterms
The immediate impact is straightforward: Rep. Shomari Figures' district — the one drawn by a federal court specifically to give Black Alabamians a second opportunity to elect a representative — is being dismantled. Under the reverted map, his constituents would be scattered across multiple Republican-leaning districts. Figures himself may no longer have a viable path to re-election.
But the wider implications are harder to overstate. This is the second major redistricting intervention by the Supreme Court in two weeks, following the Callais ruling that gutted Section 2. The pattern is now clear: the conservative majority is willing to intervene quickly, without full briefing, to reshape congressional maps before the November midterms.
The Domino Effect
Alabama is not acting alone. In the two weeks since Callais, the redistricting dominoes have fallen fast:
Florida (Apr 29): Legislature passes DeSantis's map (24R-4D) hours after the Callais ruling.
Tennessee (May 7): Gov. Lee signs a map splitting Rep. Steve Cohen's majority-Black Memphis district into three. NAACP files emergency petition.
Alabama (May 11): SCOTUS clears one-district map. Figures' AL-02 seat targeted. Primary May 19.
Louisiana: House primaries paused to pursue redistricting.
Virginia (May 11): Democrats file emergency SCOTUS appeal to reinstate their redistricting referendum, struck down by the state Supreme Court on May 8.
The cumulative math is stark. If the current trajectory holds, Republican-led redistricting could net the party a structural advantage of three to five additional safe seats nationally — seats won not at the ballot box, but in courtrooms and legislatures. Democrats need a net gain of six House seats to flip the majority. Every seat gerrymandered out of reach makes that math harder.
The Voting Rights Act in 2026
What's left of Section 2? Not much. The original provision was designed to prevent exactly what's happening now — state legislatures drawing maps that dilute Black voting power. The 2023 Allen v. Milligan decision, which created the second Alabama district in the first place, was supposed to be the guardrail. That guardrail is now gone.
Justice Kagan's dissent in Callais warned that the majority had rendered Section 2 "all but a dead letter." Two weeks later, it's hard to argue she was wrong. The court that ordered Alabama to draw a second district in 2023 has now allowed the state to undo it — using a legal framework that didn't exist when the original order was issued.
"Vacatur is thus inappropriate and will cause only confusion as Alabamians begin to vote in the elections scheduled for next week."
— Justice Sonia Sotomayor, dissenting
What Happens Next
Alabama must now decide whether to proceed with its May 19 primary under the reverted map or schedule new primaries under the legislation Gov. Ivey signed. The logistics are chaotic — voters may not know what district they're in. Candidates may not know if they're running.
For Figures, the clock is running. If Alabama redraws the district lines before the primary, he could find himself in a district where he has no realistic path to victory. If the state holds new primaries later, the delay gives Republican challengers time to organize in a friendlier district.
Either way, the precedent is set. The Supreme Court is willing to reshape the electoral map on an emergency basis, without full briefing, weeks before voters go to the polls. For the Voting Rights Act — and for the midterms — the implications are seismic.