The U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in a case related to a Republican-drawn commissioners map in Galveston County, Texas, as lower courts assess its compliance with the Voting Rights Act.
The dispute has raised concerns about potential nationwide implications and its impact on the 2024 elections.
“Republican-majority Galveston County commissioners adopted a redistricting plan that governs the four county commissions in November 2021. The plan eliminated Precinct 3, the county’s sole precinct with a black or Latino majority,” reported CNN. (Trending: Joe Biden Impeachment Formalized As Republicans Unite)
Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst said, “Even though this case is only about a local district map in Galveston, it has much broader implications.”
“The (5th US Circuit) court of appeals justified letting the unlawful map stay in place in a way that will make it much harder, going forward, for plaintiffs in Louisiana, Mississippi, or Texas to persuade any federal judge to block an unlawful map except in very short windows after elections take place,” explained the professor.
Backed by two liberal colleagues, Justice Elena Kagan wrote in her brief, “In imposing a different map acknowledged to violate current law—on the theory that the Circuit might someday change that law—the Court of Appeals went far beyond its proper authority.”
Additionally, the Supreme Court refused to consider a challenge to protective “bubble” zones around abortion clinics, rejecting a claim that such laws violated free speech rights.
According to the Washington Examiner, “The nation’s highest court refused to consider abortion rights activist Debra Vitagliano’s appeal of a lower court’s dismissal of her case challenging a Westchester County ordinance that restricted demonstrations outside of abortion facilities.”
“Vitagliano claimed that the law, which was approved in June 2022 and then revoked two months later, infringed upon the freedom of speech guaranteed by the United States Constitution,” continued the outlet.
The attorneys of The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, reportedly received support from anti-abortion activists, fourteen Republican state attorney generals and several religious organizations, while representing Vitagliano.
“There is no abortion exception to the First Amendment,” wrote the attorneys.
“Sidewalk counseling is not second-class speech, and government restrictions on it must meet the same standards as every other content-based restriction,” they continued.
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