Redistricting ruling prompts Thomas to call for gutting Voting Rights Act
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Justice Clarence Thomas said Wednesday that the Supreme Court should go further than its most recent Voting Rights Act decision, arguing that the law’s key anti-discrimination provision is divisive and should never have applied to redistricting cases.
“As I explained more than 30 years ago, I would go further and argue that: [section two] Thomas, joined by Justice Neil Gorsuch, wrote that the Voting Rights Act does not regulate districting at all.
Thomas’ remarks came as part of the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision in Louisiana v. Callais; That decision upheld a finding that one of the state’s majority-black congressional districts had an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.
The decision had broad implications and served to narrow the second part of the Voting Rights Act, the civil rights-era law that made it illegal for voting policies to discriminate based on race. The decision already restricted states’ ability to use race as a factor in determining majority-minority districts, but Thomas’ concurrence went further to say that the law should not be used for redistricting at all.
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U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas looks before swearing in Pam Bondi as U.S. Attorney General in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, DC, on February 5, 2025. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
“Today’s decision should largely put an end to this ‘catastrophic misfortune’ in voting rights jurisprudence,” Thomas wrote, quoting a 1994 memorandum.
Thomas argued that the high court’s previous interpretations of the second part of the Voting Rights Act encouraged states to engage in discriminatory, race-based map drawing. He said the text of the second part covers ballot access and voting procedures, not how states draw district lines, and so should not be used in cases involving maps.
Thomas, an appointee of President George H.W. Bush, had long advocated for repealing the Voting Rights Act provision. The conservative justice, who became the second Black justice in history after Justice Thurgood Marshall, ruled in 1994’s Holder v. In his case, Hall said those who used the second part of the law to demand redrawing districts, claiming it diluted the votes of racial minorities, misread the law.
“The assumptions on which our vote dilution decisions are based must be repulsive to any nation striving for the ideal of a colorblind Constitution,” Thomas wrote at the time.
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Voting rights activists protest outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington on Oct. 15, 2025, as the court prepares to hear arguments challenging Louisiana’s congressional map. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc/Getty Images)
The majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito fell short of Thomas’ opinion. Alito wrote that complying with the Voting Rights Act could sometimes involve the use of race, but Louisiana was not required to create a second majority-black district, meaning his map was unconstitutional.
“’For a reason it has been rare for us to accept race-based state action,’” Alito wrote, saying Louisiana “does not have a compelling interest” in packing Black voters into the district.
The years-long lawsuit stemmed from Louisiana’s redistricting efforts after the 2020 census; Meanwhile, the state added a second majority-black district after a lower court said the Voting Rights Act required it. This new map was later struck down as a racial gerrymander, prompting new litigation to the Supreme Court.
Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan participates in a debate at George Washington University School of Law in Washington, DC, on September 13, 2016. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
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Three liberal justices argued in a dissenting opinion written by Obama-appointed Justice Elena Kagan that the majority decision and Thomas’ stricter opinion eliminated protections against diluting the votes of racial minorities. The decision “completely invalidates Section 2,” Kagan wrote.
“Under the Court’s new view of Section 2, a State may systematically dilute the voting power of minority citizens without legal consequences,” he wrote.
