Supreme Court-backed GOP plot backfires as early ballots flood red states: report
Republicans set out this year to weaken Black voters' power across the South, and new numbers suggest the effort has badly misfired.
Black voters have already cast more than 160,000 more ballots than they had at this stage of the 2022 midterms, The Bulwark reported Wednesday, with the sharpest shifts showing up in Southern states, especially in Louisiana and South Carolina. Louisiana is where the case that led the Supreme Court to gut Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act began.
After the ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, Republicans in several states raced to dismantle majority-Black congressional districts. Democrats predicted the power grab would spur Black voters who usually skip midterms, though not everyone was convinced. Raymond Smith, a former state lawmaker running in North Carolina's 3rd District, told The Bulwark in June he feared the GOP's efforts "could be lost on the younger generation."...