A Shocking Betrayal of #Black Americans
by Mara Gay
The dismantling of Black political #power in the South is a great betrayal, & its effects will ripple through our #democracy.
#RepresentationMatters #SouthernStrategy #JimCrow #law #ElectionLaw #SCOTUS #ActivistCourt #VotingRights #VotingRightsAct #VRA #redistricting #elections #USpol #Trump #Republicans #WhiteSupremacy
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/05/opinion/voting-rights-act-black-voters-south.html?unlocked_article_code=1.oVA.qSCM.vEpY9cDXlL3Z&smid=nytcore-ios-share
#Black Americans have carried extraordinary burdens in the #UnitedStates, not only to exercise their own rights but also to make the country a #democracy. The #VotingRightsAct, passed in 1965 & strengthened in the decades that followed, had protected them from #RacialGerrymandering that divided them across multiple districts to blunt the impact of their votes. This was just one of a multitude of tactics Southern officials used to limit Black #suffrage & stifle competition during #JimCrow.
In more recent years, an increasingly ideological #SCOTUS began issuing rulings that weakened the #VRA. On April 29, SCOTUS’ 6–3 conservative majority eviscerated much of what was left of the #law, effectively saying that the #legislation Americans marched, bled & died for decades ago was no longer necessary. Congressional maps that diminish the #Black #vote are now acceptable, acc/to the court, so long as state lawmakers *say* they are drawing them on the basis of partisan advantage & not race.
The suggestion that partisan #gerrymandering has nothing to do with race is fantastical. It ignores the defining role of #race & #racism in shaping partisan affiliation in the #US. For instance, the embrace of the #CivilRights movement by the national #DemocraticParty is, acc/to many historians, the main reason so many white Southerners became #Republicans in the second part of the 20th century, a phenomenon known as realignment.
The Supreme Court went the exact other way, in their ruling emphasizing that race is a factor in this gerrymandering.
The state of play is absolutely not that partisan gerrymandering has nothing to do with race. SCOTUS explicitly included that as a factor.
But, while they don't ignore the role of race, you overemphasize it. Defining roles have limited impact as the things move forward from their defining moments.
That's the reality we're grappling with, and that we've been grappling with, the pushback against such reductionist thinking.
