Republicans are targeting blue state districts after U.S. Supreme Court voting rights decision

Republicans on a U.S. Senate panel suggested Tuesday that a recent Supreme Court decision weakening federal voting rights law invalidates U.S. House districts in Democratic states where most residents are racial minorities.

Sen. Eric Schmitt, a Missouri Republican who leads the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, signaled that Republicans will target majority-minority districts in blue states to maximize their chances of reshaping the political map ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. Republican-controlled southern states are already pushing for gerrymanders.

Schmitt called on the Justice Department to crack down on states that draw maps protecting majority-minority districts. A senior Justice Department official has suggested the agency supports reviewing the districts. The request appears to extend the Supreme Court’s April 29 decision restricted states from using race to draw districts.

“These maps are not constitutional because they are already being used,” Schmitt said. “They don’t survive because politicians call them voting cards. Yet they won’t go away on their own. The Justice Department has a duty to act.”

The court Louisiana v. Callais decision gave states the right to draw districts where most residents are from ethnic minority groups to gain a partisan advantage. Alabama, Florida and Tennessee have developed recent maps, and Louisiana is expected to follow soon. South Carolina is debating its own gerrymander.

The recent district boundaries, along with gerrymanders enacted before the Callais decision, could ultimately give Republicans a net gain of more than 10 seats.

The seats could prove crucial as Republicans face political headwinds amid degenerating approval ratings for President Donald Trump ahead of the midterm elections. A successful legal campaign forcing Democratic states to split majority and minority districts could lead to additional competitive House races.

Dissolve Democratic districts

About a third of all House districts drawn after the 2020 census were majority-minority districts, one said Ballotpedia analysis – a total of 148. Democrats held 122 in 2024.

Assistant U.S. Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who heads the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, wrote on social media on April 30 that the department continues to prioritize equal protection under the law, including when voting. Dhillon’s post came in response to a letter Schmitt sent to the Justice Department in which he raised similar points to what he said Tuesday.

“Senator – we are ON IT!” Dhillon wrote.

Sen. Peter Welch, a Vermont Democrat and ranking member of the subcommittee, said the Supreme Court’s decision leaves many communities of color with few enforceable tools to combat unfair handicaps. He called on the Senate to act and pass a federal ban on redistricting and partisan political campaigns in the middle of the decade.

“Our democracy ultimately depends on protecting and preserving the right of individual citizens to choose their politicians, not on increasing politicians’ control over who the voters they allow to vote are,” Welch said.

“The definition of racism”

Some Republicans have begun calling majority-minority districts racist. The loaded rhetoric suggests that eliminating these districts is not only politically useful but also a legal and moral imperative.

Missouri, where Republicans hold six of the state’s eight congressional districts, is an example of this recent reality under Callais. The Republican-controlled General Assembly in September approved a map dividing Kansas City to oust Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, a Democrat who has long represented the urban core.

State lawmakers left in place a St. Louis-area district owned by Democratic Rep. Wesley Bell, where less than half the residents are white. But some Missouri Republicans have called the district racially discriminatory and want the General Assembly to split it as well.

“This is the definition of racism: dividing districts based on skin color,” Republican Missouri Secretary of State Denny Hoskins told reporters last week. “We don’t want that in Missouri.”

In the Callais decision, the Supreme Court did not formally strike down Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits voting practices or procedures that discriminate on the basis of race and other characteristics. In practice, however, it may be virtually impossible for voting rights opponents to prove discrimination, voting rights experts say.

“It’s a question of whether lawmakers need to say, ‘Not only do I not like black voters, but that’s why I’m drafting this law,'” Rebekah Caruthers, president and CEO of the nonpartisan voting rights group Fair Elections Center, said in an interview with States Newsroom days after the Supreme Court’s opinion was released.

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court cleared away a court order that had blocked Alabama from implementing a map passed by the state legislature in 2023 that could give Republicans another seat. A lower court had found the map violated Section 2.

In Louisiana, Republican Governor Jeff Landry exposed the state’s ongoing congressional primary in anticipation of a recent map that will likely eliminate one of the state’s two majority-black districts. With its Callais decision, the Supreme Court sped up paperwork to pave the way for state lawmakers to act quickly.

Commitment to action

During Tuesday’s Senate hearing, Will Chamberlain, senior attorney for the Article III Project, a conservative legal group, said all states whose maps were drawn to protect minority representation had a “clear duty” to redraw them using race-neutral criteria.

The calendar should not be an obstacle, he argued, saying state legislatures could be called into special sessions and primaries postponed until recent maps are available.

“The fact that we are well into the 2026 election cycle does not constitute a blanket exemption from these constitutional obligations,” Chamberlain said.

Callais has unleashed chaos and already undermined fair representation of black voters, Todd Cox, deputy director and attorney at the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, told the subcommittee. However, he argued that the decision does not challenge the constitutionality of majority-minority districts or other districts that allow voters of color to elect candidates of their choice.

Cox cautioned against using Callais as a justification for targeting majority-minority districts that offer that option, saying it could be an indication that states have intentionally discriminated against minority voters.