Attorney General Marshall Fights to Return Alabama Senate Map to Hands of Elected Representatives

For Immediate Release:
May 7, 2026

For press inquiries only, contact:
Amanda Priest (334) 322-5694
William Califf (334) 604-3230

(Montgomery, Ala.) – Attorney General Steve Marshall today filed a reply brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit urging the court to throw out orders that have blocked Alabama from using its legislatively drawn State Senate map. The filing asks the court to act quickly and restore Alabama’s map following a major U.S. Supreme Court ruling issued on April 29, 2026 in Louisiana v. Callais.

The State first moved to vacate the orders after the Supreme Court’s decision in Callais significantly changed the legal standards courts must apply when deciding vote dilution claims under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. Today’s reply responds to arguments made by the NAACP plaintiffs opposing that request and argues that lifting the lower court’s injunction is necessary because no court has found that Alabama’s 2021 Senate map runs afoul of the updated standards.

“Alabama’s elections should be decided by maps drawn by the people’s representatives, not by a federal court order built on legal standards the Supreme Court just confirmed don’t apply,” Attorney General Steve Marshall said. “We are asking the court to act before Alabama voters are forced to cast ballots under a map the law cannot support.”

Today’s filing argues that the lower court’s orders are undermined by Callais at every level. The Supreme Court now requires anyone challenging a voting map to present an alternative map that fully satisfies every goal the State set when drawing its own map. The plaintiffs’ proposed map failed to do that because it split the city of Prattville, ignored shared community ties, and failed to protect incumbents.

The filing also responds to the plaintiffs’ argument that it is too late for the court to act before upcoming elections. While the Supreme Court has instructed courts not to enjoin legislative maps on the eve of an election, that is because the Court has recognized that States are in the best position to conduct their own elections. Alabama asks the Eleventh Circuit to follow that same principle by lifting the injunction prohibiting the State from conducting elections pursuant to a map the State’s own elected representatives drew. The Supreme Court reinforced this view just days ago when it expedited issuance of its judgment to allow Louisiana to move forward with its own elections under the corrected legal framework established in Callais.

Alabama is asking the Eleventh Circuit to throw out the existing injunctions and restore Alabama’s legislative map, or at a minimum to pause the orders while the case is reconsidered under the standards the Supreme Court has now set.

Read the full brief here.  

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