Le[e]gal Brief: How To Protect Black Voting Rights

In this week’s Le[e]gal Brief, attorney Lee Merritt outlines what can be done to protect Black voting rights after the Callais decision.

May 18, 2026 - 18:03

Le[e]gal Brief: How To Protect Black Voting Rights

The Supreme Court put Black voting rights on the chopping block with its ruling on Callais v Louisiana. Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act was intended to protect Black voters from disenfranchisement, but that’s all changed after the Callais decision. In this week’s Le[e]gal Brief, attorney Lee Merritt breaks down what can be done to protect our voting rights even with Section 2 being weakened.

“They moved the goalpost on voting rights. Again,” Merritt states at the start of the video. Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act allowed congressional maps to be challenged if it is found that they blatantly undermine the ability of Black and brown voters to have a voice in who represents them in Congress.

With the Callais decision, the Supreme Court increased the burden of proof required to show that a map is racially biased. You effectively need a recording of state legislators saying, “I hate Black people, and this map will prevent them from ever having a say in our elections,” to prove a map is racially biased as a result of the ruling.

“The Supreme Court took a law meant to prevent racial vote rigging, and turned it into a shield for the people actually doing it,” Merrit states. He goes on to give a pretty succinct explanation of how racial gerrymandering works in action.

“Think of democracy like chess. You can’t win by flipping over the board, so you move the pieces around quietly, so one side never gets a fair turn, ” Merrit explains. “That’s what racial gerrymandering is. It’s lines drawn so your community vote gets split up, packed in, or stretched out until your voice doesn’t matter.”

In the weeks since the ruling, we’ve already seen the consequences play out. Tennessee wasted no time in passing a new congressional map that eliminated the state’s only majority-Black district. Alabama is postponing its upcoming primary elections to implement a map that was previously found to be racially gerrymandered, and Louisiana canceled its primary election despite early voting already underway to pass a new map eliminating one of the state’s majority-Black districts.

The GOP wasted no time in disenfranchising Black voters in the South. While the situation currently feels infuriating and somewhat hopeless, Merrit explains that there are still ways for people to protect their rights.

One way you can protect voting rights is to call your senators and tell them to vote no on the SAVE Act. The SAVE Act would greatly limit mail-in voting, require voter rolls to be sent to the Department of Homeland Security, and require people to have a passport or birth certificate every time they register to vote. “The Brennan Center says the SAVE Act could prevent up to 21 million Americans from the ballot,” Merritt explains.

It’s clear the courts don’t have our back anymore, so if we want change, it’s going to come through community organizing. Get involved with your City Council or state legislature, pursue ballot initiatives that create independent redistricting committees within your state, and keep holding your elected officials’ feet to the fire. These attacks on our rights are not going to stop, so to stay informed on ways you can play defense against them, stay tuned to your weekly Le[e]gal Brief.

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