The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is one of the most important pieces of federal legislation in U.S. history. It’s also seen better days.
Republican-appointed justices on the Supreme Court effectively gutted the law in 2013, and last year, they weakened it further. Democrats in Congress have tried repeatedly to advance the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which is designed to undo the damage imposed by the conservative justices, but GOP lawmakers have blocked the bill.
Conditions may yet get worse. The Hill reported on a district court ruling from late last week:
In a 42-page decision Thursday, U.S. District Court Judge Lee Rudofsky said he would dismiss a suit brought by the Arkansas Public Policy Panel and the Arkansas chapter of the NAACP, which challenges legislative district maps approved by the Republican-controlled legislature that would divide some minority communities in and around Little Rock, unless the U.S. Justice Department joined the case as a plaintiff. Rudofsky’s reasoning: “[T]he Court has concluded that this case may be brought only by the Attorney General of the United States.”
At first blush, this may not seem especially dramatic. A judge said one group of plaintiffs can’t challenge a racially gerrymandered map, but he said a different plaintiff can.
It’s not quite that simple. For the last several decades, organizations such as the NAACP, among many others, have played leadership roles, filing lawsuits based on the Voting Rights Act. In fact, in Arkansas State Conference NAACP v. Arkansas Board of Apportionment, the state’s legal counsel defended the gerrymandered map, but didn’t argue that the plaintiffs lacked standing.
But Judge Lee Rudofsky — a Donald Trump nominee who was confirmed exclusively with Republican votes — took it upon himself to come up with the argument on his own, and then base his ruling on his provocative belief.
At this point, some of you are probably thinking that Attorney General Merrick Garland can simply do what the judge said and file the same case. He might very well do that. But consider what happens the next time there’s a Republican president who appoints a far-right attorney general who has no interest in enforcing the Voting Rights Act.
At that point, under Rudofsky’s reasoning, the Justice Department will sit on its hands, and those eager to protect voting rights through Section 2 litigation will discover the doors to courtrooms are closed.
To be sure, last week’s ruling out of Arkansas will be appealed, and it’s difficult to say whether appellate courts will agree with the district court’s decision.
But as The Washington Post’s Ruth Marcus explained, Rudofsky’s ruling “offers stark evidence of Donald Trump’s toxic judicial legacy, illustrates how conservative justices invite legal mischief to bubble up from the lower courts, and threatens what remains of one of the country’s proudest legislative achievements.” Quite right. Trump obviously is no longer in a position of power, but over the course of four years, he and Senate Republicans scrambled to push young, conservative jurists onto the federal bench, where they’ll serve for as long as they please. Over the course of the last year, Americans have seen Trump’s judges issue tough-to-defend rulings on everything from pandemic protections to the climate crisis. Now, another Federalist Society member tapped for the judiciary by the former president is targeting voting rights law. As we recently discussed, it was a few years ago when Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts told the Associated Press that it’s wrong to think about jurists through a partisan or presidential lens. “We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges,” Roberts said in a statement. “What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them.” I have always wanted to believe this. Lately, that’s been awfully difficult.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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