In response to a 2022 lawsuit, three federal judges ordered Mississippi officials to redraw some legislative districts in DeSoto County, Hattiesburg, and Chickasaw County to properly conform to the state’s nearly 40% Black population.
The Mississippi State Conference of the NAACP and several Black residents filed the suit in 2022, just as legislators enacted a 2022 gerrymander that diluted Black votes. That redistricting plan features only 42 of the 122 House districts and only 15 of the 52 Senate districts as majority Black (See Page 7). This represents 34% and 29% of both chamber’s districts, respectively.
Judges ruled on July 2, however, that the state’s 2022 gerrymandered plan represents a violation that is worse than those cited in similar lawsuits, including North Carolina v. Covington, because legislators have served little more than six months of their four-year terms. This leaves a remaining length of term that is three times as long as that of the overruled Covington scenario in Carolina.
“This ruling brings us much closer to the goal of ensuring that Mississippi has a fair number of majority-Black legislative districts to go along with the majority-White ones.” --Rob McDuff, Mississippi Center for Justice
“… [I]f left as is, Black voters in each affected district will be served for a full term by a legislator chosen in an election that diluted black votes. The harm is localized, but it is severe to the affected voters,” the judges concluded. “This is the exact kind of injury that warrants a remedy.”
Judges acknowledged that the Mississippi Legislature will likely need to revise other districts to create three new majority-minority districts, and that special elections will need to be called for all revised districts.
“It is the desire of this court to have new legislators elected before the 2025 legislative session convenes, but the parties can make whatever arguments about timing they conclude are valid,” judges said.
The decision impacting three districts was a downgrade of plaintiff claims that the legislature’s total 2022 redistricting map diluted Black voting strength, however plaintiffs still considered the decision a victory. Ari Savitzky, senior staff attorney with the ACLU’s Voting Rights Project, called the ruling “a win for Black Mississippians,” while ACLU of Mississippi Executive Director Jarvis Dortch, praised the court for seeing that “the Mississippi Legislature used the redistricting process to dilute the power of Black voters.”
Charles V. Taylor, Jr., executive director of the Mississippi State Conference NAACP, which filed the 2022 suit along with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the ACLU of Mississippi, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP, Mississippi Center for Justice, and civil rights attorney Carroll Rhodes said the Mississippi State Conference NAACP was “pleased with the decision.”
Rob McDuff, director of the Impact Litigation Initiative at the Mississippi Center for Justice: “This ruling brings us much closer to the goal of ensuring that Mississippi has a fair number of majority-Black legislative districts to go along with the majority-White ones.”
It was not immediately clear if Republican Attorney General Lynn Fitch would appeal the decision to a higher court. Tommie Cardin, an attorney for Butler and Snow, a private firm that frequently represents state Republican officials in court arguments, told federal judges earlier this year that “The days of voter suppression and intimidation are, thankfully, behind us.”
That does not mean Black representatives have a clear voice in the state’s legislative process, however—not by a long shot. Until earlier this year, white legislative leaders allowed Black House representatives to lead only two House committees. Committee leaders decide which submitted bills live and die, so Black representatives were nearly ousted from the bill-making process, despite representing nearly half of the state.
At the time, House Speaker Phillip Gunn described the move as his personal refusal to appoint Democrats to committee chairmanships. Gunn is aware that Black politicians rarely run as Republicans, however, and made no attempt to reverse the de facto exclusion of Black legislators from the legislative process.
Speaker Jason White took the wheel from Gunn earlier this year and elevated Black legislators’ from two insignificant committee leadership positions in its 52 committees to an equally paltry four chairmanships.
“Well, you need a penny to make a nickel,” said Sen. Juan Barnett at the time of the new appointments earlier this year. “No, it doesn’t represent the (40%) makeup of the state, but it’s better than it was.”
The addition of three new minority majority districts will have small effect upon legislative decisions in the 2025 legislative session. However, if Republican state leadership goes along with the ruling without appeal, they can publicly purport to be inclusive—in theory, if not in practice.
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