The front of Hugo L Black Courthouse in Birmingham, Alabama on August 15, 2023. The Northern District scheduled a preliminary injunction for the Milligan case May 22. (Jemma Stephenson/Alabama Reflector)
A federal court Friday set a hearing for May 22 on a motion for plaintiffs to block Alabama’s use of a 2023 congressional map the court previously declared racially discriminatory.
The court is reconsidering the map after the U.S. Supreme Court earlier lifted a permanent injunction against the map and sent the case, known as Allen v. Milligan, back to the lower court. The justices ordered the court to reconsider its ruling in light of its ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, a ruling last month that weakened Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and made it harder for plaintiffs to challenge maps on the basis of racial discrimination.
U.S. District Judge Anna Manasco wrote in her ruling that “appropriate relief, if any, will be issued in time for Alabama’s 2026 election to occur according to a lawful map.”
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Gov. Kay Ivey on Tuesday set special primary elections in four congressional districts to take place in August under the boundaries of the earlier map, which will likely reduce Alabama’s Black representation in the U.S. House.
Plaintiffs Friday filed motions in Allen v. Milligan and in Alabama State Conference of the NAACP v. Allen, a 2021 case that led to the redrawing of two state Senate seats in the Montgomery area.
The motions, which seek to block new primaries under laws approved in a legislative special session earlier this month, argue that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais does not apply to the Northern District rulings in the two separate cases and it is too late for Alabama to revert to the maps created by Republican lawmakers in time for the primary election happening in a few days.
“During this time, Alabamians voted and labored under the understanding that the Remedial Map would be used in the 2026 election,” the plaintiffs said in their motion for a preliminary injunction on Friday. “For months, election officials and candidates laid plans, spent money, and engaged voters based on the remedial map’s districts. And, for seven weeks, Alabama voters cast ballots under the remedial map.”
In the case of the state Senate maps, the plaintiffs stated in their motion that, “Now, the Secretary seeks the Court’s eleventh-hour intervention to change the map in the middle of that same election despite the mass confusion it will create, and the legitimate votes it will nullify.”
The state appealed the verdict on the state Senate districts in NAACP v. Allen to the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. As of Friday evening the court had not ruled in the case.
The Allen v. Milligan plaintiffs have also filed a motion for a temporary injunction.
In both filings the plaintiffs in the two cases said that changing the electoral maps would disenfranchise voters due to confusion over the rightful candidates.
“Moreover, granting a preliminary injunction to preserve the congressional districts approved by this Court is the only way to prevent the disenfranchisement of the thousands of Alabama voters who have already returned their absentee ballots,” the Milligan plaintiffs said in their motion. “Courts have long recognized that the denial of ‘the opportunity to vote in an election’ constitutes ‘an irreparable harm.’”
Plaintiffs also said earlier in the appeals process before the maps were changed that the state should not be forced to change election rules by moving to a new map because it would create problems in an election that was months away.
“The secretary’s prior representations in this matter conflict with his present ones,” the plaintiffs said in their motion regarding the state Senate districts. “At the start of the remedial phase, he represented to this court that any remedial map needed to be in place more than six months prior to the May 19 primary election to avoid calamitous effects on election administration. The secretary said that it was ‘not possible to provide a date and say with confidence that Alabama can implement a remedial map entered by that date without disruption and confusion.”’
Plaintiffs also said that changing maps violates an amendment to the Alabama Constitution approved by voters in 2022 that bans election law changes in a six-month period prior to an election. That deadline was May 3; the special session started on May 4.
The plaintiffs also said their maps do not violate the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Callais, which stated that plaintiffs that allege discrimination cannot use race when they propose new maps and that they must consider the state’s other interests.
Plaintiffs said the new maps were drawn without considering race and that the maps conformed to the state’s guidelines.
Several groups support the preliminary injunction filed by the plaintiffs in Milligan.
“Alabama’s rush to discard ballots in order to force the use of a congressional map that intentionally discriminates against Black Alabamians and dilutes their votes—as already determined by a federal court—is a craven and shameful attack on our democracy, and on the rights of all Alabama voters,” said Marina Jenkins, executive director of the National Redistricting Foundation.
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Author: Ralph Chapoco