Supreme Court signals it may rule on law protecting power of minority voters
The justices on Friday evening asked opposing parties in a battle over a Louisiana voting map to submit briefs addressing whether the state's creation of a second Black majority congressional district violated constitutional provisions that require all people to be treated equally. The district covers areas stretching from Shreveport to Baton Rouge.
'The stakes here are enormous,' Rick Hasen, a law professor at UCLA and an expert on election law, wrote on his blog.
Black voters and civil rights groups sued Louisiana in 2022 under the Voting Rights Act, saying the state's then new congressional map diluted their voting power. One of six congressional districts consisted of a majority-minority population in a state where roughly a third of voters are Black. That district covers New Orleans and parts of Baton Rouge.
The Voting Rights Act allows states in some circumstances to consider race in drawing districts as a means to redress discriminatory electoral practices, but maps that are explicitly based on race violate the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. States must carefully thread those competing directives.
Federal courts ruled for the plaintiffs in the Louisiana case, and the state redrew the map in 2024, creating the second majority-Black congressional district. A group of self-described 'non-African American' voters then sued, claiming the map was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander that violated the Equal Protection Clause.
The case made its way to the Supreme Court last term, but the justices put off a decision to allow for additional briefing. The order issued on Friday clarified the legal issues the court wanted to consider more fully. The court is likely to decide the case during its next term, which begins in October.
Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which is one of the cornerstones of civil rights era law, prohibits racial discrimination in voting practices. States have long drawn majority-minority districts to meet its provisions and protect minority voters against gerrymandered maps that diminish their power.
'What the Court seems to be asking, without directly saying it, is whether Section 2 of the VRA, at least as to how it has been applied to require the creation of majority-minority districts in some circumstances, violates a colorblind understanding of the Constitution,' Hasen wrote.
A broad ruling by the court striking down the second Black majority district in Louisiana could pare back the use of race-based redistricting. The case could also affect the balance of power in a closely divided Congress. Currently, the newly created second majority Black district is held by a Democrat.
In 2013, a divided Supreme Court invalidated another important part of the Voting Rights Act, which required certain mostly Southern states with a history of discriminatory voting practices to get federal clearance before changing voting rules. The states included Louisiana.
In 2023, the high court prohibited Alabama from using a voting map that the justices found unlawfully diminished the power of Black voters.
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an hour ago
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Denying quorum has been a Texas political strategy since 1870
"Denying quorum has been a Texas political strategy since 1870" was first published by The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan media organization. In June 1870, 13 Texas senators walked out of the Capitol to block a bill giving the governor wartime powers, depriving the upper chamber of the two-thirds quorum required for voting. Though the fleeing members were arrested, and the bill eventually passed, the 'Rump Senate incident' established quorum-breaking as a minority party tactic that has persisted in Texas politics ever since. After significant quorum breaks in 1979, 2003 and 2021, Texas House Democrats are once again employing this nuclear option, fleeing the state Sunday to block passage of a congressional redistricting map that would give Republicans five additional seats in the U.S. House. The attempt represents the latest chapter for the maneuver that political scientists say, barring exceptional endurance on the part of the democratic delegation, is likely to be symbolic rather than directly effective in preventing redistricting. "It's a messaging move," said Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston. "It's a last resort for Democrats who have run out of options legislatively and even legally." The reality of a quorum break While the Democrats technically can prevent the GOP's redistricting effort by breaking quorum, it would require the entire delegation to stay out of the state until at least November, which political scientists say is unlikely given historical precedent. "If we're going to follow our current primary schedule, we do need to have these districts approved by the Legislature before the opening of filing [for the 2026 midterms] in November," explained Mark P. Jones, a political science professor at Rice University. The challenge for Democrats is that Gov. Greg Abbott can call unlimited special sessions lasting up to 30 days each. If Democrats break quorum during the current special session, which runs through late August, Abbott could immediately call another session the next day, and continue doing so indefinitely. Even if Democrats managed to stay out of state until the November filing deadline, it could be possible for Republicans to simply hold a second round of primaries for the 2026 midterms according to Jon Taylor, a political science professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio. "Back in 1996, a couple of congressional districts in Texas were redrawn in violation of the Voting Rights Act. They actually had to hold a second round of primaries," Taylor noted. History suggests that the difficulty of living out of state away from legislator's families and day jobs makes it difficult for an entire delegation to break quorum for longer than two special sessions. "Many of them have children, families that they'll be not seeing, at least not in state, missing things from football games to confirmations," Jones said. "The precedent is that it's not that hard to do for one special session. It's possible albeit a reach for a second. Going toward a third would be unprecedented." There is also the physical difficulty of housing so many people out of state. The 2003 quorum break, prompted by another redistricting fight, 'was a pretty bare bones operation. They had to kind of set up a war room in Oklahoma under very adverse circumstances. It was not a luxury,' said Rottinghaus. Only 12 of the 62 House Democrats who have reportedly left the state need to return to restore a quorum, allowing votes to proceed. Previous quorum breaks failed. In 2021, Democrats returned after six weeks. In 2003, Democrats ultimately returned and saw the redistricting maps they opposed become law. Democrats can generate national media attention, but that coverage fades quickly. "The novelty and the nationwide media coverage will start to dissipate in a matter of a week or two," Jones said. "It's tough to keep a story on the front burner for more than a week or so, especially when there's really nothing new about it." What penalties do Democrats face? House rules adopted in 2023 impose a $500-per-day fine on lawmakers who leave the state, and indicate that campaign funds cannot be used to pay the penalties. But Texas ethics laws provide ample workarounds. "Under Texas ethics laws, it's quite easy for some group to effectively just simply pay these legislators money as a form of compensation that then they can use to pay these fines," Jones said. "Let's say Mark Cuban wants to pay all these House Democrats $1,000 a day as consultants — they can do that." Last week, The Texas Tribune reported that Democrats had begun fundraising for a potential quorum break. During the 2021 quorum break, a Beto O'Rourke-backed group gave $600,000 to Texas House Democrats' for their stay in Washington, D.C. The legislators are also likely to challenge the fines in court, potentially delaying the financial consequences of the break. "Several mentioned that [the fines] are essentially a violation of their civil liberties," Jones said, noting that former House member and current Rep. Jasmine Crockett has been among those discussing legal challenges. Can Republicans compel Dems to return? Attorney General Ken Paxton has promised his office will assist in "hunting down and compelling the attendance" of any Democrat who flees the state, however, political scientists say that there is no direct way for Republicans to compel the return of legislators who have left the state. "If the House members are outside of the state of Texas, there is really nothing they can do," said Jones. If Democrats were still in Texas, Republicans could deploy the Department of Public Safety to track them down and physically compel their attendance. In 2003, during a redistricting battle, state troopers and even federal resources were used to search for missing legislators. "They employed some federal resources to track planes that were flying out that they suspected had members on them," Rottinghaus said of the 2003 episode. The challenge of tracking down missing legislators was vividly illustrated during the 1979 "Killer Bees" episode, when a dozen Democratic state senators hid out in Austin to block changes to the primary election date. Then-Lt. Gov. William P. Hobby Jr. sent Texas Rangers and state troopers to hunt them down, leading to a weekslong game of hide-and-seek. "They got caught eventually because of an enterprising reporter who was looking at a tip or rumor, and managed to confront one of the state senators taking out the trash," Taylor said. But Republicans' most potent weapons may be political rather than legal. They can pressure Democrats by arguing other important legislation, including emergency aid for recent Hill Country flooding and regulations on consumable hemp, is being held hostage by the walkout. "State Republicans may make a case that the future of the STAAR test or THC regulation or some funding for some of the disasters that have taken place recently are all in jeopardy because Democrats have bailed," Rottinghaus said. Republicans could also take novel, aggressive measures, like trimming the $20,000 monthly operating budgets given to House members to run their offices' operations or declaring the seats vacant and triggering special elections, Rottinghaus said. The last option has never been used, even during the most contentious previous quorum breaks. For some legislators, that most drastic option is already on the table. In a July 30 letter sent to the Republican Caucus, Rep. Brent Money, R-Greenville wrote 'Should members flee the state for an extended period, the Governor has the constitutional authority to declare their seats vacant.' This article originally appeared on Corpus Christi Caller Times: Denying quorum has been a Texas political strategy since 1870
Yahoo
2 hours ago
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The Supreme Court Just Signaled Something Deeply Disturbing About the Next Term
Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. Reading the tea leaves from cryptic Supreme Court orders can be perilous business because the justices are not bound by the questions they ask at oral argument, the offhand comments they make at a judicial conference, or even their monumental 'shadow docket' rulings on emergency petitions that have become all too common. But a technical briefing order in a long pending case out of Louisiana, posted on the Supreme Court's website after 5 p.m. on a Friday in August, was ominous. The order was likely intended to obscure that the court is ready to consider striking down the last remaining pillar of the Voting Rights Act, known as Section 2. Such a monumental ruling, likely not coming until June 2026, would change the nature of congressional, state, and local elections, all across the country, and likely stir major civil rights protests as the midterm election season heats up. Louisiana v. Callais, the case that was the subject of last Friday's cryptic order, is a voting case over the drawing of Louisiana's six congressional districts. Louisiana has about a one-third Black population, but after the 2020 census the state legislature drew a districting plan, passed over a Democratic governor's veto, that created only one district in which black voters would be likely to elect their candidate of choice. Before Callais, Black voters had successfully sued Louisiana in a case called Robinson v. Ardoin, arguing that Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act required drawing a second congressional district giving black voters that opportunity. Section 2 says minority voters should have the same opportunity as other voters to elect their candidates of choice, and courts have long used it to require new districts when there is a large and cohesive minority population concentrated in a given area, when white and minority voters choose different candidates, and when the minority has difficulty electing its preferred representatives. After Robinson and more litigation, the Louisiana legislature drew up a new plan which created the second congressional district. The state drew the second district to otherwise favor Republicans in the state overall, including House Speaker Mike Johnson. A new group of voters then sued in the Callais case, arguing that Louisiana's drawing of the second district violated the U.S. Constitution's Equal Protection Clause by being a racial gerrymander. Since the 1993 case of Shaw v. Reno, the Supreme Court has found racial gerrymanders when race is the predominant factor in drawing district lines, and the state has no compelling interest in drawing such lines. When the Supreme Court first held oral argument in the Callais case in March, it appeared to be another in a long series of cases (many out of Louisiana) in which the court considered whether race or partisanship predominated in the drawing of district lines. I've long written that this is an impossible exercise in places like Louisiana where the factors overlap —most white voters in Louisiana are Republicans and Black voters are Democrats, so when the state discriminates against Democrats it is also discriminating against Black voters. It appeared from the initial March oral argument that the court was going to once again determine whether race or party predominated. But instead of deciding the case at the end of June when the court ordinarily disposes of the cases heard during the term, the court set the case up for re-argument. That's rare but not unheard of. Back in 2010, the Supreme Court set the Citizens United case up for re-argument the following September. But when the court issued its June order in Citizens United for re-argument, the same order told the parties that the court wanted something new to be briefed and argued on re-argument: whether to overrule a line of cases allowing limits on corporate spending in elections. The court the following January then overruled these cases in one of the most consequential election law cases of our time that has had significant reverberations for our politics ever since. Fifteen years later, something similar seems to be happening with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. In June of this year, rather than deciding the case it heard in March, the court issued an order in Callais setting the case for re-argument and stating that 'in due course, the Court will issue an order scheduling argument and specifying any additional questions to be addressed in supplemental briefing.' Justice Clarence Thomas impatiently dissented from the order, saying now was the time to recognize that Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and the court's racial gerrymandering case are on a collision course and to kill off Section 2 or rewrite it to be toothless. We waited weeks for the court to issue its rescheduling order and when it came this past Friday it was a doozy. The court pointed specifically to a set of pages in plaintiffs' brief which argue that Section 2 is unconstitutional, at least as applied in this case, and that the Voting Rights Act cannot serve as a compelling interest to defeat a racial gerrymandering claim when race predominates. 'The parties are directed to file supplemental briefs addressing the following question raised [in that brief]: Whether the State's intentional creation of a second majority-minority congressional district violates the Fourteenth or Fifteenth Amendments to the U. S. Constitution.' Although the court's order did not explicitly mention Section 2 or even the Voting Rights Act more generally—unquestionably to obscure things further—there is no doubting what's going on here. The court is asking the parties to consider whether Louisiana's compliance with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by drawing a second majority-minority district—as the earlier Ardoin case seemed to require—was unconstitutional under a view of the Constitution as requiring colorblindness. If the Supreme Court moves forward with this interpretation it would be a sea change to voting rights law. A reading of the Constitution as forbidding race-conscious districting as mandated by Congress to deal with centuries of race discrimination in voting is at odds with the text of the Constitution, with the powers granted directly to Congress to enforce the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, and with numerous precedents of the Supreme Court itself. It would end what has been the most successful way that Black and other minority voters have gotten fair representation in Congress, state legislatures and in local bodies. It would be an earthquake in politics and make our legislative bodies whiter and our protection for minority voters greatly diminished. Even if the court less drastically says that Section 2 could not be used to require the second congressional district in this case, such a superficially more minimal ruling would mean the quick unraveling of most Section 2 districts because if the facts in Louisiana don't justify drawing a second district, most other Section 2 claims would fail too. A ruling killing or crippling Section 2 would be in line with what we have come to expect from the Roberts Court. Back in 2013, the court struck down as unconstitutional the other main pillar of the Voting Rights Act, the one requiring that jurisdictions with a history of race discrimination in voting get federal approval before making changes in voting laws that could decrease minority voting power. When the court did that in Shelby County, holding that the formula for deciding which jurisdictions had to get preclearance was outdated, Chief Justice John Roberts left open the possibility that Congress could write a new formula, knowing full well that it wouldn't be able to write one that would satisfy both a majority in Congress and the Supreme Court. He further assured us that 'Our decision in no way affects the permanent, nationwide ban on racial discrimination in voting found in § 2.' And now, that second pillar could well fall too. Court conservatives likely thought teeing up the issue of overruling Section 2 on a hot summer weekend would avoid public notice. But that's a short term strategy. Come next June, any decision to strike down what's left of the Voting Rights Act could kick off the start of a new civil rights movement and more serious talk of Supreme Court reform in the midst of crucially important midterm elections. A court fundamentally hostile to the rights of voters places the court increasingly at odds with democracy itself. Solve the daily Crossword
CBS News
3 hours ago
- CBS News
Kristi Noem says "Alligator Alcatraz" to be model for ICE state-run detention centers
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says "Alligator Alcatraz" will serve as a model for state-run migrant detention centers, and she told CBS News in an interview that she hopes to launch a handful of similar detention centers in multiple airports and jails across the country, in the coming months. Potential sites are already under consideration in Arizona, Nebraska and Louisiana. "The locations we're looking at are right by airport runways that will help give us an efficiency that we've never had before," Noem said, adding that she's appealed directly to governors and state leaders nationwide to gauge their interest in contributing to the Trump administration's program to detain and deport more unauthorized migrants. "Most of them are interested," Noem said, adding that in states that support President Trump's mission of securing the southern border, "many of them have facilities that may be empty or underutilized." The Department of Homeland Security strategy builds on the opening of a 3,000-bed immigration detention center at a jetport in South Florida last month. Dubbed Alligator Alcatraz by state and federal officials, the makeshift facility will cost an estimated $450 million to operate in its first year. Up and running in just 8 days, the tents and trailers at Dade-Collier Training and Transition Airport are surrounded by 39 square miles of isolated swampland, boasting treacherous terrain and wildlife Last month, President Trump toured the facility, seeing rows of bunk beds lined up behind chain fences and encircled by razor wire. Mr. Trump joked to reporters there that "we're going to teach them how to run away from an alligator if they escape prison." Asked if the temporary facility would be a model of what's to come, the president said he'd like to see similar operations in "many states." The Arizona's governor's office told CBS News they have not been approached about a state-run facility. For her part, Noem called the Alligator Alcatraz model "much better" than the current detention prototype, which largely contracts out its Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention capacity to for-profit prison companies and county jails. ICE is an agency that falls under DHS. This model relies on intergovernmental service agreements (IGSAs) negotiated and signed between ICE and individual localities. She called the Florida facility – with an eventual price tag of $245 per inmate bed, per night, according to DHS officials – a cost-effective option. "Obviously it was much less per-bed cost than what some of the previous contracts under the Department of Homeland Security were." According to the Office of Homeland Security Statistics, the estimated average daily cost of detaining an adult migrant in fiscal year 2024 was about $165, though the actual cost of detention typically varies based on region, length of stay and facility type. Still, Noem argued that the new venues, all with close proximity to airports or runways, will help ICE to cut costs by "facilitating quick turnarounds." "They're all strategically designed to make sure that people are in beds for less days," Noem said, adding that some of the facilities being considered are still undergoing vetting by the department and subject to ongoing negotiations. "It can be much more efficient once they get their hearings, due process, paperwork." Unlike Alligator Alcatraz, which uses funds from a shelter, food and transportation program run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Noem said the state-based initiative will tap into a new $45 billion funding pool for ICE prompted by President Trump's "big, beautiful bill", which was signed into law last month. The pool of money is allocated specifically to the expansion of ICE's detention network and will nearly double the agency's bedspace capacity of 61,000 beds, based on cost analysis. As of Saturday, ICE was holding just over 57,000 individuals in its detention network in more than 150 facilities nationwide. Noem – who has implemented a department-wide policy across DHS of personally approving each and every contract and grant over $100,000 – said keeping ICE detention contracts to a duration of under five years is now "the model we've pushed for." For instance, she added, Alligator Alcatraz is a one-year contract that can be renewed. "For me personally, the question that I've asked of every one of these contracts is, why are we signing 15-year deals?" Noem said. "I have to look at our mission. If we're still building out and processing 100,000 detention beds 15 years from now, then we didn't do our job." The new policy is a departure from earlier agreements made under the Trump administration. In February, ICE signed a 15-year, $1 billion deal with the GEO Group, a private prison company, to reopen Delaney Hall, a two-story, 1,000-bed facility that ranks among the largest detention centers in the Northeast. Still, Noem said she doesn't feel the U.S. is moving away from a private detention model. "I mean, these are competitive contracts," she said. "I want everybody to be at the table, giving us solutions. I just want them to give us a contract that actually does the job – a contract that doesn't put more money in their pockets while keeping people in detention beds just for the sake of that contract." But Alligator Alcatraz has also come under fire from attorneys claiming that both the Trump and DeSantis administrations are holding detainees without charge or access to immigration courts, violating their constitutional rights. Attorneys argued in a legal filing last month that unauthorized migrants held at the Florida-run site have no legal recourse to challenge their detention. Lawyers and experts have also called into question the very legality of a state-run immigration detention center, given the federal government's authority over immigration enforcement. Opening the detention center in the Everglades under Florida's emergency state powers marked a departure from the federal government's role of housing migrant detainees, an option typically reserved for those who've recently entered the country illegally or those with criminal convictions. A U.S. district judge last week ordered state and federal officials to provide a copy of the agreement showing "who's running the show" at the Everglades immigrant-detention center. "Florida does not have the legal authority to detain undocumented immigrants in the absence of a contract with ICE," said Kevin Landy, the director of detention policy and planning for ICE under President Barack Obama. "A state government can't do that." Detainees held at Alligator Alcatraz have also claimed unsanitary and inhumane conditions, including food with maggots, denial of religious rights and limited access to both legal assistance and water. Florida officials have denied the accusations. Still, tucked away in the Florida Everglades 45 miles west of Miami, if its location sounds treacherous, Noem concedes, that's kind of the point. "There definitely is a message that it sends," the secretary said. "President Trump wants people to know if you are a violent criminal and you're in this country illegally, there will be consequences." Noem offered that deterrence is an effective strategy based on U.S. gathered intelligence "from three letter agencies, from other intelligence officials throughout the federal government and in a lot of the Latin American and South American countries" that indicates "overwhelmingly, what encourages people to go back home voluntarily is the consequences." "They see the laws being enforced in the United States," Noem said. "They know when they are here illegally and if they are detained, they'll be removed. They see that they may never get the chance to come back to America. And they're voluntarily coming home." The DHS secretary met with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum in March. "One of the questions I asked President Scheinbaum when I was in Mexico is, 'Do you have any idea how many people may have come back to Mexico that we may not know about,'" Noem said. "[Sheinbaum] said 500,000 to 600,000 people have come back to Mexico voluntarily since President Trump's been in office," Noem continued, explaining that the Mexican president believes her reluctant citizens fear losing the chance to return to the U.S. on a visa or work program. It's a datapoint she solicits from many of the foreign leaders she meets with, including Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa, who shared a 90-minute lunch with the DHS secretary in Quito, last Thursday. "I asked him the same question," Noem recalled. "He doesn't have as many illegal immigrants in the United States as in Mexico and Venezuela, but he said he thinks over 100,000 of his citizens have come back to Ecuador. And that's a huge number." Noem reasoned that her Ecuadorian counterpart's rough estimate is based on two factors – a strengthening Ecuadorian economy and a DHS television campaign launched across Latin and South America, warning prospective migrants not to enter or remain in the U.S. illegally. "He was very proud of the fact that he's doing better with his economy. So there's jobs," Noem recounted. "But he said, you know, our ads are running in Ecuador. We're telling people that, if you have family in the United States that are there illegally, it's time to come home."Margaret Brennan and Camilo Montoya-Galvez contributed to this report.
