I Wish I Could Say I Was Surprised

Professor Vladeck:

Second (and last) #SCOTUS ruling is the big one, Louisiana v. Callais.

For a 6-3 majority (Rs v. Ds), Justice Alito purports to narrow the ability of states to draw majority-minority districts as a remedy for race-based vote dilution, but, per Kagan's dissent, comes pretty close to gutting the VRA:

From that dissent:

"I dissent because Congress elected otherwise. I dissent because the Court betrays its duty to faithfully implement the great statute Congress wrote. I dissent because the Court’s decision will set back the foundational right Congress granted of racial equality in electoral opportunity. I dissent."

The 15th amendment, along with the 13th and 14th, were meant to provide some repairs to the fabric of a country that institutionalized racism.

At least we got rid of slavery.  But equal protection of laws still means “white people first,” and the 15th amendment is still the red headed stepchild, to which the Roberts Court has said again: “Nice try,”

It may be in the constitution, but that doesn’t mean we have to inconvenience white people over it.

... what the majority does today is to impose the Callais requirements. At their base, all those requirements have the same function: They force a vote-dilution plaintiff to prove that a State adopted an election rule with racially discriminatory intent. On the majority’s view, a rule diluting minority votes—even making them count for nothing—poses no problem if motivated by “nonracial factors.” Ante, at 24. So a State has free rein to “use traditional districting factors” even when they minimize or cancel out minority votes. Ibid. And yet more practically important, a State may (so says the majority) draw districts for any political purpose, including for a purely “partisan purpose[]”—that is, to increase one party’s electoral strength—no matter their racial effects. Ante, at 25. For that reason, the majority insists, a [VRA] Section 2 plaintiff has "a special burden to overcome."

Kagan, J., dissenting.

None dare call it “white man’s burden.” After all, discrimination against white people is the real race problem in America. That’s why the struggle to maintain this racist system is such a difficult one, and requires so much justification.

I can read every word of Alito’s opinion, and understand his argument. That’s the problem: I understand his argument.

I leave the legal riposte to the good Professor:

LULAC makes Callais worse:

Justice Alito's Callais opinion purports to preserve claims in which there's evidence of racially discriminatory intent.

But this is the same Court that simply waved its hands at a district court's *detailed* factual findings of exactly such evidence in the Texas case.

It’s almost as damning as what I said. Because it’s not the first time Alito and the majority have ignored the facts in favor of the outcome.