A federal appeals court on Monday ruled that private parties could not bring challenges to voting district maps under the Voting Rights Act of 1965, reserving that ability for the U.S. government alone.
Private parties currently bring the majority of legal challenges to state and federal district lines under the Voting Rights Act. The act prohibits officials from creating election rules that discriminate against persons based on their race.
The federal appeals court ruling sets up a possible showdown at the U.S. Supreme Court.
What case is this related to? The appeals court panel upheld a decision made by a federal judge in Arkansas last year, saying only the U.S. attorney general had the ability to file challenges to voting district lines under the law.
The Arkansas chapter of the NAACP and the Arkansas Public Policy Panel had challenged Arkansas’ state voting maps.
This story originally appeared in WORLD. © 2023, reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.
Maybe I’m missing something here. This ruling by the appeals court says that the current government proposing all the voting district changes is the only entity that can challenge them? I sincerely doubt the group that sets potentially race based voting districts to help keep political power is going to challenge their own “work”. wake up everybody. This is a bad deal for all Floridians.