Federal judges on May 26 issued an order temporarily blocking Alabama’s plan to implement a new congressional map that could help Republicans in the November elections for the U.S. House of Representatives.

A three-judge panel on a federal district court ordered the state to continue using court-ordered districts from a 2024 map. The state could appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Attorneys for black voters had argued that the new map discriminated against black voters.

The new ruling comes out of a long-running dispute over how congressional districts are drawn in Alabama.

Following the 2020 U.S. Census, the Republican-controlled Legislature drew a map that contained one majority-black district.

Black voters and activist groups sued, citing Section 2 nondiscrimination provisions of the federal Voting Rights Act, arguing that the map diluted minority voting power. The Supreme Court ruled 5–4 in Allen v. Milligan (2023) that the map violated the act and held that the state must create a second black-majority district.

However, the Supreme Court in Louisiana v. Callais in April narrowed how Section 2 can be used to contest maps. The high court ruled that race may only be a minor factor in redistricting rationales, not the predominant, overriding reason for how congressional districts are drawn.

The Alabama Legislature then redrew the congressional map so it gave Republicans a 6–1 advantage over Democrats.

The panel’s new ruling holds that the newest redistricting plan is “tainted by intentional race-based discrimination.”

The Legislature “doubled down on racially discriminatory vote dilution after we and the Supreme Court found that it was racially discriminatory vote dilution.”

It is clear that the Legislature did not have “party politics in mind,” and the only evidence as to intent “tells us that considerations of race were the key reason,” the panel said.

The Supreme Court has held that gerrymandering, or the manipulation of electoral district boundaries to benefit a particular party or constituency, passes constitutional muster when it is done to boost partisan fortunes.

“We do not lightly intrude in state affairs, but our previous review of the undisputed evidence left us in no doubt that Alabama’s legislatively enacted plan intentionally discriminated based on race in violation of the Constitution. Our re-examination in light of Callais yields the same conclusion,” the panel said.

The panel said the Legislature knew that approving a plan without an additional black-majority district “would dilute Black Alabamians’ opportunity to participate in the political process, and it intentionally enacted that very plan.”

After the Callais decision, Alabama went forward with its May 19 primary elections, but postponed four of the congressional races, which are expected to be decided in a special election on Aug. 11.

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said he would “immediately appeal” the panel’s decision to the Supreme Court.

“I am disappointed, but not at all surprised, that the three-judge panel has again struck down Alabama’s blandly unobjectionable congressional map that has been in place for decades,” Marshall said in a statement. “This is a very fluid situation, and I will do my best to keep the People of Alabama apprised of our efforts. Know this—in my mind, it is not a matter of whether we win this case, only when.”

This article by Matthew Vadum appeared May 26, 2026, in The Epoch Times.

Photo: Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, a Republican