Obama Slams Supreme Court Ruling Voiding Race-Based Gerrymandering

Former President Barack Obama joined several Democrats in criticizing the Supreme Court’s decision overturning a racial redistricting map in Louisiana, saying it “effectively destroys a key pillar of the Voting Rights Act.”

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“Today’s decision by the Supreme Court effectively destroys a key pillar of the Voting Rights Act, by allowing state legislatures to redistrict to systematically dilute and weaken the voting power of racial minorities – provided they do so under the guise of ‘partisanship’ rather than explicit ‘racial bias,'” Obama said. “And this is just one more example of how a majority of the current Court appears determined to abandon its vital role of ensuring equal participation in our democracy and protecting the rights of minority groups against the excesses of the majority. »

Katherine Hamilton of Breitbart News reported that in a 6-3 decision, the conservative majority on the Supreme Court found the map to be “an unconstitutional gerrymander”:

The conservative majority ruled 6-3 that the map “is an unconstitutional gerrymander” but stopped short of abandoning Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.

“Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was designed to uphold the Constitution – not to conflict with it. Unfortunately, lower courts have sometimes applied this Court’s §2 precedents in a manner that requires States to engage in the race-based discrimination that the Constitution prohibits,” Justice Alito wrote for the majority.

Other Democrats, such as former Vice President Kamala Harris and New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, have responded to the Supreme Court’s decision. Mamdani said it “risks disenfranchising millions of Americans on racial grounds.”

“Today’s decision by the Supreme Court is a direct attack on the promise of the Voting Rights Act,” Mamdani wrote in a statement. job on X. “It risks disenfranchising millions of Americans on racial grounds and weakening the very foundations of our democracy.”