SCOTUS Sides With South Carolina GOP in Voting Map Case

Facts

• The US Supreme Court (SCOTUS) ruled 6-3 Thursday to uphold South Carolina's Republican-drawn congressional district map. This reverses a lower court's ruling that said the map was an unconstitutional gerrymandering.¹
• The decision, written by conservative Justice Samuel Alito, said to make a racial gerrymandering case, you 'must disentangle race and politics' to 'prove' motivation 'by race as opposed to partisanship.' He added that you must presume 'the legislature acted in good faith.'²
• Alito also noted that while the South Carolina legislature achieved its 'goal by increasing District 1's projected Republican vote share by 1.36%,' it also raised the proportion of Black voters in the district 'from 16.56% to 16.72%.'³
• In the dissenting opinion, liberal Justice Elena Kagan said the conservative majority is 'reworking the law' to 'impede racial-gerrymandering cases,' adding that they should respect the 'more than plausible' ruling of the lower court.¹
• The three-judge lower court that ruled the map unconstitutional had also asked SCOTUS to make its decision by Jan. 1, but said that, if that doesn't happen — as was the case — the contested district map would have to remain in place for the 2024 election.⁴
• The map took 30K Black voters from District 1, which is held by Republican Rep. Nancy Mace, and put them in District 6, which is held by Democratic Rep. James Clyburn.²

Sources: ¹thehill.com, ²FOX News, ³New York Post and ⁴New York Times.

Narratives

• Democratic narrative, as provided by naacpldf.org. This ruling is both practically and morally disgraceful. The lower federal trial court correctly found clear evidence of Black voters being pushed out of District 1, but SCOTUS decided to disregard those facts and instead greenlight continued racial discrimination. This ruling has essentially brought South Carolina back to the days of legal racially-based discrimination.
• Republican narrative, as provided by Supremecourt. Since Black voters tend to vote at about 90% Democrat, some maps end up looking like they're racially gerrymandered. In reality, they're simply based on politics. In this case, not only was the map drawn based on partisanship, but it ended up increasing the proportion of Black voters in the district. District maps should not be deemed discriminatory just because someone doesn't like their outcome.
• Cynical narrative, as provided by Center for American Progress. Both Democrats and Republicans gerrymander massively, making American democracy far from fair. Election laws should change.

Predictions