Virginia's top court deals huge blow to Democrats

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0:19Larry Kaplow:WBUR Podcasts. Boston.

0:25Terri Sewell:It's Friday, May 8th, and this is a special bonus episode of Here and Now Anytime from NPR and WBUR. I'm Chris Bentley.

0:41Terri Sewell:Today, in a surprise ruling, the Virginia Supreme Court threw out new voting maps that would have likely helped Democrats pick up four seats in Congress. this fall. Democrats and Republicans are pushing to redraw congressional maps all across the country outside the normal process every 10 years. It's a fight that President Trump kicked off last year in Texas to try to ensure Republican control of the House in the upcoming midterm elections. Democrats are outraged by today's ruling, and we'll hear from one of them in just a minute.

1:13Larry Kaplow:We will appeal this because at the end of the day, what the Virginia court is doing is subverting the will of the people.

1:19Terri Sewell:But first, more on the case itself. NPR's Larry Kaplow told Indira Lakshmanan the Virginia court said there were procedural problems with last year's referendum that was approved by voters. This came down to a lot of very technical questions about the complicated process that Virginia had to go through to try to redistrict before the midterms. Virginia is a state that usually has a bipartisan commission do the redistricting. That's in the state constitution. So Virginia lawmakers, Democrats, to get this done had to amend the constitution. That takes a public vote. and the court and the Republicans who argued against this said that they violated their own legislative procedures in very technical ways.

2:07Terri Sewell:For example, they had to vote at the end of October to get this. They had to vote twice, once in October and then once when the new legislature was formed after the November elections. Virginia, as an aside, they do their elections in off years. And the court said that they voted too late in October for voters to understand what their lawmakers were doing when they went to vote in November. It was procedural, but they said that those procedural mistakes made the vote null and void. Well, I think one thing that's going to confuse people is that we did a lot of coverage when voters approved this referendum just last month in a special election.

2:49Terri Sewell:Democrats had spent very heavily to win that race. And now it seems that a court can just step in and invalidate the outcome of a Democratic election. Explain to us how that works. Well, that is the question people are pointing at. Before they had the election on April 21st, the court was asked to rule on it. And they said, you can go ahead with the election and the court will deal with the legal issues afterwards. That made many Democrats feel very confident that the same court would eventually uphold the results of the election. In oral arguments before the legislature, lawyers for the legislature said even if there were technical processes that were violated, that doesn't outweigh the will of 1.6 million voters who voted for this.

3:40Terri Sewell:But they did overrule it. They said all along they plan to come back to these legal issues. Democrats are very upset about it. Senator Tim Kaine, a Democrat, put out a statement criticizing the decision. He said it was a sad day for Virginians to, quote, see their votes cast in the trash. Cast in the trash. By a 4-3 ruling. All right. On the Republican chair, Joe Cruders, said it was the Democrats who were trying to rig the vote. Larry, we have less than a minute left, but in light of the big Supreme Court decision last week that gutted a provision of the Voting Rights Act and the fact that Republicans have already started redistricting, not just with Texas last summer, but Tennessee yesterday, how big of a blow is this for Democrats?

4:24Terri Sewell:It's a big blow. Remember, the U.S. House is controlled by Republicans by just a few seats. President Trump set off this race to redistrict. Republicans have probably tilted about 15 seats their way. And the Democrats had gotten to about 10 but lose four. So now it's around 15 to 6. And there are more southern states moving to redistrict for the GOP in the coming days. Of course, this all matters because midterms are only six months away, so it's causing a lot of uncertainty. That's Larry Kaplow, an editor on the NPR States team. Larry, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you.

5:03Terri Sewell:We've got more on this story. Let's take a short break and then we'll get some reaction from a Democratic congresswoman who's in her own redistricting fight in Alabama and says state lawmakers there are trying to disenfranchise black voters. Peter O'Dowd has that conversation in just a minute.

5:27Terri Sewell:This message comes from Midi Health. CEO Joanna Strober shares why they started a virtual care platform for women in paramenopause and menopause. Our goal at Midi is to make sure that all women have access to really expert care, starting around 35 and 40, making sure that they get access to all the things that can help them thrive as they're growing older. MidiHealth, committed to helping women in midlife with paramenopause and menopause care, accessible via telehealth visits at joinmidi.com. Well, as Larry just said, a handful of states in the South are moving forward with new maps that would benefit Republicans.

6:07Terri Sewell:They're diluting mostly Black districts after that U.S. Supreme Court case weakened the Voting Rights Act last week. And one of those states is Alabama. We're going to bring in Congresswoman Terri Sewell now. She's a Democrat, the first black woman elected to Congress from Alabama. Congresswoman, welcome. It's nice to speak with you. Good day. First of all, what's your reaction to this Virginia decision? Because if Democrats can't redistrict there, what does it mean for your party in the midterms?

6:34Larry Kaplow:Well, first of all, this is a very disappointing decision from the Virginia Supreme Court. If you think about it, the Republicans in Texas and Florida didn't even ask the people of their state to weigh in on whether to redistrict or not. And in California and in Virginia, voters actually voted, voted on redrawing the maps. And it is a race to the bottom. I will grant you that. I think none of us benefit from this race to the bottom on seats. But I think that we will appeal this because at the end of the day, what the Virginia court is doing is subverting the will of the people and we will appeal it.

7:12Terri Sewell:Let's talk about what's happening in your state of Alabama. It looks like the state may go back to maps from 2023 that the Supreme Court itself actually struck down because they discriminated against black voters. There were protests, as you know, this week at the state capitol. Will your district remain intact?

7:30Larry Kaplow:Well, the 2023 map takes my district down to 50 percent, but it takes the districts two down to 30 percent. You know, to me, this is not about some representation. It's not about no representation. It's about fair representation. Black voters make up nearly one third of Alabama's electorate. And what state lawmakers are doing is trying to dilute the power of Alabama Black voters, silence their voices, and eliminate their ability to elect congressional and state leaders of their choice. So what we're demanding is simple, fair representation. This is not about party politics. It's about whether Black Alabamians have a seat at the table or whether they will let state lawmakers take us back to the Jim Crow era.

8:17Larry Kaplow:You know, if you're not, if you don't have a seat at the table, and I've been blessed to represent Alabama's 7th Congressional District, a district I grew up in. I'm a daughter of Selma, Alabama, where people died, fought, bled, marched on a bridge for the right of all Americans to vote. And what the Supreme Court has done is to favor partisan gerrymandering, even if it results in taking away or diluting the voting power of black and minority voters.

8:45Terri Sewell:You mentioned state lawmakers in Alabama. Here's Chris Pringle, Alabama Republican, who sponsored this legislation to go back to the old map from 2023. He's speaking recently at a debate in the Alabama House, and he's rejecting the claim that this dilutes the vote of black citizens. Let's listen.

9:01Larry Kaplow:The blacks still have the right to vote. We're not infringing on the right for them to go on the voting price and cast a ballot. What do you think? They may not be infringing on our ability to go into a ballot boot and vote, but who we vote for, what's on that ballot, is being diluted and devalued. If we can't have a candidate of our own choosing on that ballot, then the vote that we're taking is a vote to not represent ourselves. And it's simply unfair. The Supreme Court decision has made it harder for us to bring voter dilution cases. It has changed the standard for actually winning those Section 2 cases.

9:39Larry Kaplow:And, you know, from where I sit, this is not a black or white issue, black voter versus white issue, Republican versus Democrat. This is a right versus wrong. And our democracy is built on representation. And for minority voters not to have a say in that democracy is simply unfair.

9:56Terri Sewell:Well, as I said earlier, you are the first black woman elected to represent Alabama in Congress. It took until 2010 for the state to reach that milestone. What does the Supreme Court's decision now mean for the future generation of black politicians and leaders in the South?

10:11Larry Kaplow:I think that the Supreme Court decision will lead to the largest reduction of black representation in American history. The very first African Americans to represent Alabama were elected during Reconstruction in the 1870s. And once the Reconstruction ended, it took 115 years before the next African American was actually chosen to go to Congress in 1992. And we simply cannot allow this partisan gerrymandering to take away the right of minority voters to choose their leaders. It's allowing the leaders to choose their voters, and it's simply not fair. And no one benefits. I want to be very clear.

10:52Larry Kaplow:No one benefits when the voices of the American people are silenced. Any of the American people are silenced and have no seat at the table. If you don't have a seat at the table, you're on the menu.

11:03Terri Sewell:Speaking of the voice of the people, the primary in Alabama is in 11 days on May 19th. People have already voted in that election. We were just hearing how Virginia's Supreme Court rejected the state's redistricting referendum that would have drawn new maps favoring Democrats. Are you concerned with how elections across the U.S. will be carried out with this much uncertainty? So close to primary season.

11:27Larry Kaplow:Yeah, you know, the Supreme Court is actually going against their own precedent in the Purcell case, where they said that it was an Alabama case, interestingly enough, that Alabama could not change its map because the election had already started. And I have already, for one, voted absentee in that May 19th primary, since I will be in Washington, D.C. We're in session that day. And so, you know, what you're doing is disenfranchising those that have already voted. And a lot of them are the elderly. Some of them are the military that are going off to Iran. You know, it's simply unfair that we're in the midst of this and they're trying to upend it.

12:06Larry Kaplow:It is causing confusion and it's simply not right.

12:10Terri Sewell:Terry Sewell, Congresswoman, Democrat from Alabama, thank you so much for speaking with us.

12:15Larry Kaplow:Thank you. I wanted to remind my people, the folks who are listening, of what John Lewis said the last time he was on the bridge. You know, John was riddled with cancer that last time he was on the bridge right before his death. But his body was riddled in Selma. Yeah. And his body was frail, but his voice was strong. And he said, never give up, never give in. Keep the faith and keep our eyes on the prize. We have to simply get into some good trouble and make sure that every American's voice is heard in this democracy.

12:47Terri Sewell:Congresswoman Sewell, thanks.

12:49Larry Kaplow:Thank you.

13:03Terri Sewell:We are always following the news here and here and now anytime, or as much of it as we can get to in this day and age. But we've also got stories that are far from the typical headlines. Today, we've got an episode about fish, birds, and bats, and some of the people that have devoted their lives to saving them. Check out our conversations with author and naturalist Mark Kurlansky, intrepid bat conservationist Irodo Tanshi, and ornithologist Scott Wiedensahl, who says despite everything, it is not too late to save some of the world's most endangered species of birds. One of the biggest hurdles we face is despair.

13:45Terri Sewell:Is it going to be hard to bring back birds? Might it be impossible to really bring back birds? Maybe, but the only way we know it's impossible is if we don't try. A world that works for birds in their complexities of migration, the fact that they inhabit every single ecosystem on this planet, if we can figure out a way to make this world work for birds, it's going to work just fine for everything else, including us.

14:12Terri Sewell:Listen to that whole conversation now in our other episode out today. And if you want to make sure you don't miss anything else, click that follow button for more here and now anytime from NPR and WBUR Boston. Today's stories were produced by Jenea Williams and Jill Ryan. Our editors were Michael Scotto and Micaela Rodriguez. Technical direction from Caleb Green and James Trout. Here and now's executive producer is Alan Price. I'm Chris Bentley. Thanks for listening.

14:41Larry Kaplow:Thank you.