Supreme Court Signals It May Strike Down State Voting Rights Laws Too

The Voter Suppression Playbook Goes State-by-State

Last week, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed a sweeping voter suppression bill that requires Floridians to present specific documentary proof of citizenship to register to vote or stay on the voter rolls. Civil rights groups warn the law will disenfranchise millions of eligible voters when it takes effect in January 2027, and lawsuits are already underway.

Florida is the fourth state this year to pass this type of citizenship requirement, joining Utah, South Dakota, and Mississippi. In total, 11 states have enacted proof-of-citizenship laws since 2022. These laws are modeled on the federal SAVE Act, which has stalled in the Senate but is being implemented piecemeal at the state level.

This wave of restrictive legislation didn't happen in a vacuum. It's the direct result of the Supreme Court spending over a decade systematically dismantling the Voting Rights Act, the landmark 1965 law that finally made the Constitution's prohibition on racial discrimination in voting a reality.

How the Supreme Court Broke Voting Rights

The Court's 2013 decision in Shelby County v. Holder gutted the VRA's most powerful tool: a requirement that jurisdictions with histories of discrimination get federal approval before changing their voting policies. That "preclearance" provision had been extraordinarily effective at stopping discriminatory laws before they could disenfranchise voters.

Shelby County changed everything. Without preclearance, known bad actors could implement bad laws freely. The decision emboldened a nationwide movement hostile to multiracial democracy.

Since 2013, dozens of states have passed over 100 laws restricting voting rights. They've purged voter rolls, ended same-day registration, reduced early voting, limited mail voting, closed polling places, imposed strict voter ID requirements, and abused redistricting. The cumulative effect is mass disenfranchisement, particularly of voters of color.

The Court made things worse in 2021 by inventing a new legal standard that makes it harder for voters to prove a law discriminates based on race. And this year, in Louisiana v. Callais, the Court is entertaining an argument that district maps drawn to fix illegal racial gerrymanders are themselves racial gerrymanders -- making it essentially impossible to remedy discrimination.

States Tried to Fill the Void

As the Supreme Court dismantled federal protections, some states attempted to pick up the slack. Nine states have passed their own voting rights acts since 2001, including six since 2018. These state laws guard against race-based denial or dilution of voting rights, and some reestablish preclearance requirements within their borders.

These laws are necessary countermeasures to the ongoing assault on voting rights. But there's new reason to believe the Supreme Court will target state voting protections too.

The Shadow Docket Strikes Again

Last month, the Court issued a shadow docket order in Malliotakis v. Williams that should alarm anyone who cares about voting rights or state sovereignty. The case involved a New York state trial court's determination that a district map violated the New York constitution by denying Black and Latino voters equal opportunity to participate in politics.

The state court directed New York's Independent Redistricting Commission to draw a new, fair map. But the Supreme Court blocked that directive -- interjecting before the state's high court could weigh in and before the Commission even drew a new district. The Court flouted federal laws that limit its authority to intrude on state affairs.

The three liberal justices dissented. There's no majority opinion explaining the decision. The only rationale comes from Justice Sam Alito's concurrence, which reveals the conservative majority's thinking.

Alito wrote that drawing a new district "for the express purpose of ensuring that minority voters are able to elect the candidate of their choice" constitutes "unadorned racial discrimination." He called such redistricting "an inherently odious activity" that violates the federal Constitution in all but the "most extraordinary" circumstances. Remedying a violation of state law, he made clear, doesn't count as extraordinary.

In other words: Alito thinks state measures designed to protect voters of color from racist attacks on their rights are themselves racist. And the Court's conservative majority is willing to meddle in state court decisions they disagree with, even when they have no legal authority to do so.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor warned in dissent that "every decision from any court is now fair game" for conservatives seeking "a sympathetic ear" at the Supreme Court.

The Endgame

The pattern is clear. The Supreme Court gutted the federal Voting Rights Act. States tried to protect their own voters. Now the Court is signaling it will strike down state voting protections too.

This isn't about legal principle or constitutional interpretation. It's about power. The conservative majority has spent years making it easier to restrict voting rights and harder to challenge those restrictions in court. Now they're suggesting that any effort to ensure voters of color can meaningfully participate in democracy is itself unconstitutional discrimination.

The Court has already made it nearly impossible to prove voting laws are discriminatory. It's made it nearly impossible to fix discrimination when you do prove it. And now it's threatening to make it illegal for states to protect their own voters when the federal government won't.

This is what the dismantling of democracy looks like: methodical, relentless, and wrapped in the language of colorblind neutrality. The conservative legal movement has turned the Voting Rights Act from the most effective civil rights law of all time into a dead letter. State voting rights acts may be next.