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The lawmakers who represent Alabama’s two Black congressional districts, who are now at risk of losing their seats after the Supreme Court effectively decimated the Voting Rights Act, said the decision sends the US “backwards”.

The 6-3 ruling in Louisiana v Callais on Wednesday weakens a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, opening the door for Republicans to eliminate majority-minority congressional districts across the south, and representatives Terri Sewell and Shomari Figures stand in the crosshairs.

“People in my home town fought, braved, died, marched for the right of all Americans to vote,” Sewell, who represents Alabama’s seventh congressional district, said shortly before Wednesday’s decision. “And I know I wouldn’t be here, were it not for the Voting Rights Act. I mean, actually, all Black elected officials. It’s pretty frightening to think that on our collective watch, we’re going backwards and not forwards.”

Figures, who represents Alabama’s newly drawn second congressional district, said the ruling threatens far more than the seats currently held by Black members of Congress. “The impact will be great,” he said in an interview before the decision, anticipating that the court would weaken the landmark voting law. “At the end of the day, the Voting Rights Act is about fairness. It’s about having the opportunity to elect members of Congress of your choice, and not have the district lines drawn in a way that inhibits the ability of a significant racial group to have an impact in the outcome of an election.”

In a ruling split along ideological lines, the Supreme Court affirmed that Louisiana’s congressional maps violated the equal protection clause. Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito held that section 2 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which for four decades had been used to challenge electoral maps producing racially discriminatory results, does not require states to draw majority-minority districts. Justice Elena Kagan, in a dissent joined by justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, wrote that the decision effectively eviscerates the law. 

‘All we want is fair representation.’

The implications for Alabama are immediate and deeply personal for both Sewell and Figures. Republican lawmakers in Alabama will likely move quickly to redraw the state’s congressional maps, Sewell said, but not in time to affect the 2026 midterms. The state’s deadline to qualify as a major party candidate for the 19 May primary was in January, meaning it’s likely too late for Republicans to change maps before the upcoming elections. Sewell and Figures may be safe in November, but Republicans will likely redraw their districts and push them out of Congress in 2028.

Sewell, who represents a swath of the state’s Black Belt that includes Selma, the city where she grew up – has served in Congress since 2011. For 13 of those years, she was the only Democrat in Alabama’s congressional delegation and the only representative from a district where Black voters could elect a candidate of their own choice. Her district, which winds through some of the poorest counties in the nation, was itself a product of the Voting Rights Act, redrawn to give Black Alabamians, who make up about 28% of the state’s population, a voice in federal representation.

Figures’ district, the newly drawn second district, exists solely because of a recent legal victory. The seat was created after the Supreme Court ruled in Allen v Milligan in 2023 that Alabama’s congressional map illegally diluted Black voting power. That decision reaffirmed section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and compelled Alabama to draw a second opportunity district. Figures, a first-term congressman from Mobile, won that seat in 2024 in what Sewell called a historic moment: for the first time in modern Alabama history, two Black representatives sat together in the congressional delegation.

“It was a long time coming,” Sewell said of that day. “When you think about representation, all we want is fair representation.”

Wednesday’s ruling puts that representation directly at risk. But Sewell and Figures were both clear that the threat extends far beyond Congress. With the Voting Rights Act weakened, representation at all levels is threatened, Sewell said, including in state legislatures, county commissions, city councils, and school boards.

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The 6-3 ruling in Louisiana v Callais weakens a key provision of the Voting Rights Act. Composite: Javier Palma/The Guardian/Getty Images

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