Civil Rights Leaders Respond to Supreme Court Decision in Louisiana v. Callais
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: [email protected]
WASHINGTON — The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and its coalition members issued the following statement in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais:
Today’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais is a defining moment for our democracy and a direct test of whether every American has an equal and effective voice in the political process.
At its core, this case has always been about fairness and representation. After a federal court found that Louisiana’s congressional map violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act by denying Black voters — who make up roughly one-third of the state’s population — an equal opportunity to elect candidates of their choice, the state enacted a remedial map with a second majority-Black district. This case challenged that remedy and, in doing so, threatened one of the most important protections against racial vote dilution in our democracy.
Today, the Court has taken a dangerous step backward, weakening one of our nation’s most critical civil rights protections. By undermining Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, this decision makes it harder to challenge discriminatory maps and opens the door to further dilution of Black political power and the voices of communities of color.
The stakes of this case extend far beyond Louisiana. Across the country, communities are facing mounting barriers to participation — from restrictive registration requirements to polling place closures and redistricting practices that dilute the political power of communities of color, voters with disabilities, elderly voters, and low-income voters.
These tactics are not new. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was enacted to confront a long history of voter suppression, from poll taxes to literacy tests. Today’s barriers may look different, but their impact is the same: silencing voters and weakening our democracy.
Maya Wiley, president and CEO, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights: “For as long as Black people have lived in this country, our right to vote and power to decide who leads have been attacked. Today, a majority of this Supreme Court has once again made clear its hostility to the rights this country fought a civil war to win and over a hundred years to protect. It has put its foot on the scale of partisan politicians’ ability to discriminate freely against Black voters and other voters of color. Every voter deserves a fair map, free of discrimination. Every voter of color deserves the fair chance to elect people who can be held accountable to meeting their needs and responding to their problems. That includes Black voters. We haven’t just come this far by faith as a civil rights community. We have come this far by fighting for voting rights. We have the power as a multi-racial coalition to ensure that voters of all races can vote and that their voices will be heard at the ballot box. This is not over.”
Hannah Fried, co-founder and CEO, All Voting is Local: “The Supreme Court’s ruling on Louisiana v. Callais takes away some of our most fundamental freedoms: the right to be heard and for all of our votes to be counted equally. It strips Black voters of fair and equal representation and makes it harder for people in other historically excluded communities to have their voices heard on issues like affordable housing, good-paying jobs, quality health care, and safe communities. When politicians choose their voters instead of voters choosing their leaders, we all lose. We will not let this decision dishearten us. We remain clear-eyed and driven. We will continue to focus on building the democracy we deserve—one that invites people in, not one that keeps people out.”
Gloria L. Blackwell, CEO, American Association of University Women (AAUW): “This decision is a blow to fair representation and to the democratic values AAUW has worked for across generations. When maps dilute Black voting power, women and families lose ground on the issues that matter most — from strong public education to equal pay to civil rights protections. We will continue to stand for a democracy where every voter is heard, every community is counted, and every woman has the power to help shape our future.”
Christine Chen, executive director, Asian and Pacific Islander American Vote (APIAVote): “For the past 13 years, Supreme Court decisions have steadily weakened the Voting Rights Act, and today’s ruling destroys core protections for our democracy, especially for voters of color. The Voting Rights Act has been critical in breaking down barriers that many Asian American and Pacific Islander voters still face. Voters of color should have a fair say in our democracy. Politicians should not choose their voters. Voters should choose their politicians. This is a day of shame for the Court. The work will be more challenging due to this decision, but we were built for this moment. Democracy will not fall on our watch.”
Bethany Li, executive director, Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund: “The American South has historically served as a critical bellwether for civil rights in the United States, acting as the epicenter of both institutionalized racism against Black people and the organized movements that fought hard to dismantle it. The court’s ruling on Callais further entrenches the long-standing barriers to fair representation for Asian people who have been too often excluded through redistricting and other voter suppression tactics despite Asians now making up the fastest growing racial group in the country. The Supreme Court sends a message that racial minorities, including Black folks, Asian folks, and other communities of color, will continue to face systemic challenges as they build political power.”
John C. Yang, president and executive director, Asian Americans Advancing Justice – AAJC: “The impacts of the court’s decision will be felt far beyond Louisiana – it will weaken voting protections across the country for every community of color. Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act is one of the most important provisions to curb racial discrimination in voting policies and district maps. This has been critical for ensuring that communities of color, including the Asian American community, can elect leaders who reflect their lived experiences. While this is a profound setback in civil rights, we will not relent ensuring fair representation for all.”
Kristin Powell, executive director, Black Futures Lab: “Once again, the promise of equal protection under the United States Constitution has been broken, and it is a major setback for our multiracial democracy. Our vote has power—period. That’s why it’s being attacked. We are the inheritors of a long line of builders, visionaries, and freedom fighters who pushed this country forward. We know that Black voters have a vision for stronger and thriving communities for all. That’s why we launched the Black Census Project to invite 300,000 Black Americans to dream about a new system of government that meets our needs. If you believe in a true democracy – in a system designed for all of us – then join us at BlackCensusProject.org.”
April England-Albright, national legal director, Black Voters Matter: “Voting Rights in the United States is at an important inflection point. As the U.S. Supreme Court is determining whether to end the Voting Rights Act, the US Congress is debating and attempting to pass the most regressive and restrictive voter suppression legislation, ‘the Save Act’, seen since Jim Crow in the US. But like the 600 people in Selma Alabama on the Edmond Pettus Bridge who did not retreat despite the level of force present at the foot of the bridge, we will not retreat. Instead, we will move forward, by relentlessly fighting for expanded federal voting rights legislation, state level voting rights, rank choice voting, proportional representation opportunities to give more marginalized representation, and constitutional changes. And we are going to win.”
Wendy Weiser, vice president for democracy, Brennan Center for Justice: “Today’s ruling is a devastating blow to equality in political representation for all Americans. In Callais, the Roberts Court has essentially completed its decades-long project to demolish the landmark Voting Rights Act. It has effectively blessed racial discrimination and encouraged partisan gerrymandering. And it has undermined the ability of voters of color to have a fair chance at representation. This is a shameful betrayal of American values and the gains of the civil rights movement, and an assist to the partisan project of gerrymandering America. Every American should be outraged and saddened. Congress has a duty to act immediately. It must strengthen voting rights, ban partisan gerrymandering, and reform the Supreme Court.”
Omar Noureldin, senior vice president for policy and litigation, Common Cause: “Congress must end their cowardly silence and pass a new voting rights act and redistricting legislation immediately. We cannot continue to allow the powerful who are threatened by a multi-racial democracy to cherry pick cases and arguments that allow the Supreme Court to slowly reduce our civil rights and our voting rights. Congress is a co-equal branch of government and it must act.”
Amb. Norm Eisen (ret.), executive chair, Democracy Defenders Fund: “It is a dark day for our country. The Roberts Court has all but eliminated the Voting Rights Act’s strongest remaining tool for stopping discriminatory maps and election practices. Voters will now have fewer ways to block discrimination in how districts are drawn, and ultimately how their communities are represented. It is more important than ever to meet this moment with an all-out, cross-coalition effort to ensure equal access to the ballot for Black and Latino citizens and the freedom to vote for all.”
Skye Perryman, president and CEO, Democracy Forward: “Today the Court dealt a severe blow to free and fair elections in the United States. The Voting Rights Act, passed by a bipartisan majority after the nation witnessed the horrors of racially motivated state-inflicted violence on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, has been a crown jewel of our nation’s civil rights protections and has been essential to voting rights in the United States. As it has done with so many of our nation’s protections, the U.S. Supreme Court majority has significantly harmed voting rights and, in so doing, the American people. This decision will open the door to anti-democratic suppression of the right to vote, making it easier for a revival of Jim Crow tactics and diluting the power of voters of color. While this is a sad day for our democracy and fair representation in America, the path forward is clear: we must recommit to protecting and exercising our right to vote and to using our voices to oppose extreme power grabs of state and federal governments that seek to subvert the voices and votes of the people. We must hold those in power who have — for too long — opposed or delayed progress toward more comprehensive voting protections to account. Our team at Democracy Forward believes in the power of the people in this nation. We are resolute in our commitment to protecting the people, voting access, and free and fair elections, even if the Court’s majority did not.”
Lauren Groh-Wargo, CEO, Fair Fight Action: “The far‑right high Court has chosen to drag America backward towards Jim Crow, tearing down one of the most important protections that kept politicians from rigging voting maps for their own power and silencing voters of color. Mass resistance is needed now and mass turnout is critical in November’s elections. Discriminatory maps will be challenged – and we will keep fighting until every American has an equal voice in our democracy.”
Meredith Sumpter, president and CEO, FairVote: “For more than six decades, the Voting Rights Act has protected our most sacrosanct rights as Americans and brought our founders’ highest ideals to life. The Court’s decision today cannot be understood apart from race; the decision will make it far more difficult for voters of color to win fair and equal representation. Yet the struggle for equality and a truly multiracial democracy is as old as this nation, and it will continue. We will continue to work alongside partners across the country to build a democracy in which all of us, regardless of race or ethnicity, have equal voice and an equal chance at representation.”
Leah Greenberg, co-executive director, Indivisible: “The Supreme Court has gutted Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, stripping away one of the last safeguards against racially discriminatory maps and a cornerstone of civil rights. This decision gives states a green light to silence Black and Brown voters and dismantle hard-won representation. This is a coordinated attack on multiracial democracy. This decision demands an organized, immediate response from elected leaders at all levels.”
Lourdes M. Rosado, president and general counsel, LatinoJustice PRLDEF: “The Supreme Court dealt a devastating blow to democracy today. The Louisiana v. Callais decision thwarts victims of proven discriminatory vote dilution from regaining their political power. As the courts, federal government, and states continue to attack the political power of voters of color, LatinoJustice will dig in unrelentingly to ensure our communities are not disenfranchised or disempowered.”
Damon Hewitt, president and executive director, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law: “For decades, Section 2 served as a powerful mechanism to address discrimination against Black voters and other voters of color. Today, the Supreme Court rewrote it — claiming to leave the law intact while making it infinitely more difficult, if not impossible, to prove a violation exists at all. Two days ago, the Court gave Texas carte blanche to trample the rights of Black and Latino voters. Today’s ruling continues that pattern. Communities of color are left with rights on paper, but virtually no effective remedies in fact. We must use every tool at our disposal to fight back — and pursue reform of a Court that has become both logically and morally bankrupt.”
Celina Stewart, CEO, League of Women Voters: “By gutting Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act today, the Supreme Court has abandoned its constitutional mandate and hammers the final nail in the coffin of its own legitimacy. The Court brazenly reverses its own precedent from only two years ago in Milligan, greenlighting anti-voter lawmakers to disenfranchise constituents of color through redistricting, and erases decades of hard-won progress towards a multiracial democracy secured through Section 2. But the League will not be deterred. We will fight—relentlessly—to ensure that the people have the power, not courts or legislators that have forsaken them, to decide who represents us.”
Derrick Johnson, president and CEO, NAACP: “Today’s decision is a devastating blow to what remains of the Voting Rights Act, and a license for corrupt politicians who want to rig the system by silencing entire communities. The Supreme Court betrayed Black voters, they betrayed America, and they betrayed our democracy. This ruling is a major setback for our nation and threatens to erode the hard-won victories we’ve fought, bled, and died for. But the people still can fight back. Our best defense and offense is the ballot box, and we’re going to turn out voters for the midterm elections to make sure we can elect representatives who look out for us. Our democracy is crying for help.”
Renee M. Willis, president and CEO, National Low Income Housing Coalition: “Upholding Louisiana vs. Callais is critical to ensuring that Black and Brown voters and low-income renters are not unfairly targeted through redistricting, which would undermine decades of hard-won protections for marginalized communities. This case reinforces essential safeguards against discriminatory voting practices and affirms the right of marginalized communities to have a meaningful voice in our democracy. Through NLIHC’s nonpartisan Our Homes, Our Votes campaign, we aim to ensure that marginalized communities, including low-income renters, participate fully in the democratic process. We stand with our partners to advance fair representation and protect the fundamental right to vote.”
Marc H. Morial, president and CEO, National Urban League: “Today’s decision by the Supreme Court is an attack on Black voting power, an attack on Black America, and an attack on the future of American Democracy. If this is a nation where every American should have the right to freedom and to have a voice in the future of this country, then we must speak out when the highest court in the land chooses to silence large swaths of any of our communities based on the color of our skin or our beliefs.”
Robert Weissman and Lisa Gilbert, co-presidents, Public Citizen: “The Supreme Court just issued a license for states to strip away the rights of voters of color. The Voting Rights Act recognized that guaranteeing the basic right to vote of people of color in the United States required affirmative federal protections. Through a steady series of decisions based on the demonstrably false premise that racial discrimination in the U.S. electoral system is nothing more than a historic memory, the Supreme Court has gashed at the Voting Rights Act, leaving it little more than an empty shell. The direct result is the evisceration of the rights and freedoms of voters of color. This ruling strips voting power away from already disenfranchised communities. It paves the way for barely disguised racial gerrymanders that will disempower Black and Brown voters and dramatically shift power to favor Republicans.”
Joseph Bryant, executive vice president, SEIU: “The Supreme Court’s decision is a direct attack on Black voters and on the promise of equal representation. It is a deliberate attempt to weaken our power because when we vote together, we change outcomes. When politicians try to control elections instead of voters choosing their leaders fairly, it’s working families who pay the price, in higher housing costs, lower wages, and health care. But let’s be clear: courts do not have the final word, people do. Our vote matters, our voices matter, and we will organize, mobilize, and win.”
Bradley Heard, deputy legal director for voting rights, Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC): “The Supreme Court’s decision is a profound setback and has national implications for protecting voters from racial discrimination through redistricting tactics. Today’s decision is the latest in a string of decisions from this Court weakening the Voting Rights Act. Fair representation is a democratic promise and this decision will change the trajectory of voting rights for Black Louisianians and Black and Brown people across the country. But our values remain unchanged: Every voter deserves an equal voice. Because our democracy belongs to all of us, the SPLC will continue advocating for fair representation for all Americans, no matter their race, color, or place of national origin.”
Brett Edkins, managing director of policy & political affairs, Stand Up America: “This is a gift to Donald Trump and Congressional Republicans who are pressuring states to draw new congressional maps to avoid accountability at the ballot box. It’s time for Congress to act as a check on this rogue Court through major reforms, including term limits, an enforceable code of ethics, and adding more justices who will defend our fundamental freedoms once Trump leaves office.”
Barbara R. Arnwine, Esq. and Daryl D. Jones, Esq., co-leaders, Transformative Justice Coalition: “The original foot soldiers who crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge in 1965 gave everything for the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and to ensure equal voting rights for everyone. The most conservative U.S. Supreme Court since 1935 is now setting back the time clock regarding the impact of the Black vote to pre-1965 levels. This is unacceptable! We must demand more from our U.S. Supreme Court and our U.S. Congress. We must speak with our vote in 2026!”
This case is part of a broader, coordinated effort to weaken democratic safeguards and reshape our political system in ways that reduce accountability and entrench power. We will not allow that to happen without a fight.
The Leadership Conference and the coalition will continue to advocate for policies that protect the right to vote, ensure fair representation, and uphold the foundational principle that our democracy works best when it works for all of us.
The fight for a truly representative, multiracial democracy did not begin with this case, and it will not end here.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights is a coalition charged by its diverse membership of more than 240 national organizations to promote and protect the rights of all persons in the United States. The Leadership Conference works toward an America as good as its ideals. For more information on The Leadership Conference and its member organizations, visit www.civilrights.org.
###