Legal AF by MeidasTouch - Supreme Court Makes MAJOR RULING on Election

Episode Date: May 25, 2024

The MAGA wing of the Supreme Court led by —who else Sam Alito—just declared the “bleaching of African American voters” constitutionally permissible, by approving South Carolina’s racially drawn US congressional maps, further disenfranchising black US citizens. Michael Popok explains how this further gutting of the Voting Rights Act will change the face of South Carolina politics for ages. Thanks to Prolon! Head to https://ProlonLife.com/LEGALAF to get 15% off their 5-day nutrition program. Visit https://meidastouch.com for more! Visit https://meidastouch.com for more! Join us on Patreon: https://patreon.com/legalaf Remember to subscribe to ALL the MeidasTouch Network Podcasts: MeidasTouch: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/meidastouch-podcast Legal AF: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/legal-af The PoliticsGirl Podcast: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-politicsgirl-podcast The Influence Continuum: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-influence-continuum-with-dr-steven-hassan Mea Culpa with Michael Cohen: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/mea-culpa-with-michael-cohen The Weekend Show: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/the-weekend-show Burn the Boats: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/burn-the-boats Majority 54: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/majority-54 Political Beatdown: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/political-beatdown Lights On with Jessica Denson: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/lights-on-with-jessica-denson On Democracy with FP Wellman: https://www.meidastouch.com/tag/on-democracy-with-fpwellman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Let me tell you what happened and let me tell you what's going to happen going forward based on this US Supreme Court decision. Basically, they never see race as the predicate for redistricting, even when it's obvious that legislators, not for partisan reasons, not because they're Republicans, they want to make more Republican districts, but because they want black people to be disenfranchised. That's what the trial court in South Carolina Federal said after hearing empirical evidence in the case, Alexander versus the South Carolina state chapter of the NAACP. That's what a three-judge unanimous panel of the South Carolina Federal District Court of all places, also said that the reason that the state house had removed 62% of African-American voters

from the first district and sent them off to the sixth district, basically creating almost like a ghetto in the sixth district, by sending black voters to where Senator Clyburn already had an overwhelming majority. So they just took all the black voters and sent them to the sixth and freed up the first for white people.

That's why Nancy Mace in the first district got a 14 point advantage and when she won in the last election. They basically made the first, a white Republican stronghold by taking 62% of the black voters out and sending them off to Clyburn's sixth district. Sound bad?

The district court thought so. The appellate court thought so. But you know who doesn't think so? Sam Alito. He actually created a new burden on plaintiffs that will now change the face of MAPS and the Voting Rights Act and redistricting going forward. And he was joined by the usual suspects, Chief Justice Roberts, Amy Coney Barrett, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh. Six to three against Kagan,

Kataji Brown Jackson, and Sotomayor. That's the way things are gonna be for a long time unless the Democrats win in November and able to change the face of that Supreme Court. Now it didn't affect, unfortunately it doesn't affect what's going on in the November. So I wanna like manage expectations here. It took the United

States Supreme Court so long to issue their ruling, you know, sort of in the last month of the term when they heard this case over a year ago, really towards the end of the last term, that the maps were already set. These racist maps were already used in 2023 and will be used in the November election in 2024. But now there's the new, as I mentioned before, now there's a new burden or hurdle that plaintiffs have to face or satisfy, according to Sam Alito, picking this out of his backside, out of his rear end, because it's nowhere in constitutional precedent. And that is if you're going to accuse, or let me do it the other way, all actions of a state house must be presumed to be not racist, even in the deep South.

That they did it for partisan reasons, if they say that out loud, and that's enough. And to overcome that, it's a very strong presumption that what the legislators are doing, mainly white, is not racist, it's partisan. And if it's racist, if it's partisan, not racist, it doesn't violate the Voting Rights Act. Particularly, this is what Justice Alito said,

having come up with a new legal framework. But let me tell you what that framework is so we understand it. The proper response to this, this is from Alito. When a federal court finds from his opinion, that race drove a legislature's redistricting decisions. It is declaring that the legislature engaged in offensive and demeaning conduct that bears an uncomfortable

resemblance to political apartheid. We should not be quick to hurl such accusations as at the political branches." Right? And then Chief Justice Roberts and the others said, the court has no power in these types of cases. Oh, suddenly the court is powerless when to address racism and violations of the Voting Rights Act. They go on in the dissent written by, or a concurring opinion written by Clarence Thomas of all people. He said he would have gone further and get out of the business of assessing claims of racial gerrymandering altogether. The court has no power to decide these types of claims. Drawing

political districts is a task for politicians, not federal judges. There's no judicially manageable standards for resolving claims about districting and regardless the Constitution commits those issues to the political branch. Oh yes, it's unseemly for the United States Supreme Court to step in and enforce the Voting Rights Act, which has been found to be constitutional, only when it's not in their favor. So now what do we have? We have a United States Supreme Court 63 majority led by Sam Alito, who's in the news right now, because he's close to getting censured, if not impeached, for flying not one,

but two flags in support of Donald Trump and insurrectionists at his home while he's presiding over cases and hasn't recused himself. That's for another hot take. In fact, I did another hot take. Here I'm talking about the dirty work that he's doing with the others on the majority of the Supreme Court to gut the Voting Rights Act.

Now I was a little surprised because recently they made a decision in which they did find a voting rights map, a congressional map under the Voting Rights Act to be unconstitutional and racist. And that the only and the sole reason that the redistricting was done there was to disenfranchise black voters.

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we have a new judicial precedent by Sam Alito. You are to assume that the House of that state is acting in a partisan, not racial way, even against the weight of empirical evidence that was developed at the trial court level. Here we have again, the United States Supreme Court led by the MAGA majority, ignoring the development of the record below at the trial court level in which witnesses were put on and experts in the area of empirical analysis of voting maps and redistricting maps and racial. And they concluded the experts that testified and it was given weight not just by the trial judge, who's a federal judge,

but also by a unanimous decision by the South Carolina federal district court. Not an easy panel to win about black rights issues in the South, I assure you. But even they, it was as plain as the nose on their face, even they know racism when they see it and racial gerrymandering when they, it was as plain as the nose on their face, even they know racism when they see it and racial gerrymandering when they see it. But not for Sam Alito, not from his perch in Virginia and Long Beach Island vacation home flying flags in favor of Donald Trump. Those maps look fine.

62% of the black voters take it out district one and put in district six. And the result is that a white lady wins by 14 points seems fine to us. Put all the blacks in Clyburn's district, the sixth, seems fine to us. This is called disenfranchisement of disadvantaged people. But the United States Supreme Court, which is supposed to protect disadvantaged people,

make sure their vote counts, is blind. It's not that justice is blind. It's that the Supreme Court majority is blind to racial inequality in America. And it's maddening to me that Chief Justice Roberts, who replaced ultimately, if we're going to have an African American seat, an African AmericanAmerican seat, an African-American seat of the United States Supreme Court after Thurgood Marshall passed away, to have Clarence Thomas, right? Who goes out of his way to oppose affirmative action

in higher education and otherwise, who goes out of his way to put a blindfold on and ignore racial gerrymandering in districts. For him to be, you know, along with Todd G. Brown Jackson, now who appointed by Biden, one of two black Supreme Court justices on the United States Supreme Court, and this is what he chooses to spend his time on,

on concurrences like this one, that says, oh, it's the state's fault for the United States Supreme Court to get involved with political issues. It's not a political issue. It's a racial inequality issue. It's a 14th Amendment issue. It's a civil rights issue. Have you no decency, man? Have you not read the Constitution and the Civil War Amendments, the Reconstruction Era amendments and why they were put in place. It's hard to believe. I mean, Abraham Lincoln would be spinning

like a rotisserie in his grave if he knew what was going on up here. Fought so hard to make black Americans, black Americans equal under the law with rights, including voting rights. No more greater right exists than the right to vote in a democracy. And a right to vote in a way

where your vote is not diluted or you're not the victim of racial gerrymandering. But to say I'm a leader on the others, mainly white, they never see it. They never see it. And they don't care if the state houses of these deep south states controlled by majority white people find ways to argue that it's not racial. I suddenly become foghorn, leghorn, whatever I do this. It is partisan.

We just want to strengthen the Republican hold while we have the House. Really? You didn't transfer 62% of Democrats, you transferred 62% of black people from one district to another. And why don't you send the 62% of the black people to another district and give them another

black majority district? How about that? That properly reflects the racial composition in South Carolina. And where is Nikki Haley, former governor of South Carolina, who now used to be a critic of Donald Trump. Now she's playing by his rules. I'm going to vote for Donald Trump. Really? It's playing by his rules. I'm gonna vote for Donald Trump. Really?

It's just maddening. And we have to call it out. We do it right here on the Midas Touch Network, on illegal AF, we're the network we're building with our bare hands with your help. No outside investors, we're completely independent. The way you can support us is, let's say on a hot take like this one from me,

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After hearing the story about Alitos, and all the Alitos, and this story, you can understand why we called it and named it Legal AF four years ago. It's at the intersection of law and politics. It's every Saturday and Wednesday at 8 p.m. Eastern time, right here on this Bitus Touch YouTube channel. Free subscribe, help them get to three million, and listen to us on audio podcast platforms

of your choice. So until my next hot take, until my next Legal AF, this is Michael Popak reporting. Hear ye, hear ye. Legal AF Law Breakdown is now in session. Go beyond the headlines and get a deep dive into the important legal concepts you need to know and we discuss every day on Legal AF. Exclusive content you won't find anywhere else, all for the price of a couple of cups of coffee. Join us at patreon.com slash legal AF. That's patreon.com slash legal AF.