Apparently, it is possible for Republican lawmakers to draw majority-Black districts, since Georgia Senate Republicans unveiled a new map proposal on Monday with two of them.
The new proposal comes after U.S. District Court Judge Steve Jones ordered lawmakers to create one additional Black majority congressional district, two additional state Senate districts and five additional state House districts. Jones argued that the current map violated the rights of Black voters to choose a candidate.
The fact that Georgia lawmakers even created one additional Black majority district puts them ahead of their Republican colleagues in Alabama, who infamously refused to create an additional Black majority district despite multiple court orders. Even the Supreme Court had to weigh in (multiple times)!
But before anyone busts out the special civil rights victory champagne, it’s worth diving a bit deeper into the details.
The first thing to note is that the new map would likely allow Republicans to remain in power. Georgia Senate lawmakers created the new map by eliminating two majority-white districts held by Democrats.
More importantly, however, that’s not exactly what the judge ordered. According to the Associated Press, Republicans failed to create two additional Black Senate districts in the southern part of metro Atlanta despite the Judge’s orders. In other districts Jones declared illegal, lawmakers did pretty much nothing to change the racial makeup. Interestingly enough, Republicans did draw new lines for a number of Democratic-held seats that the Judge did not ask them to change. The new districts are likely to majorly shake up races for Democrats.
It’s not certain if the Judge will accept this new map proposal. Lawmakers still have time to draft an official map during the special legislative session that began on Wednesday.
Georgia lawmakers certainly benefit from the fact that Alabama lawmakers made the new floor for following court orders in hell.