The Redistricting ‘Unholy Alliance’ and Up-For-Grabs Voters

A reason for hope amid SCOTUS fallout

The media has a habit of two-dimensionalizing complex stories to feed audiences simplistic clickbait. This might help drive short-term traffic, but it damages the nation’s ability to understand itself.

For people looking to build a stronger democratic future, understanding complexities is essential. Building a political coalition that can attract a strong American majority requires getting outside of echo chambers and recognizing what’s really going on in the electorate.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Big media often leave out facts and context that don’t support a certain narrative. That’s been the case in recent days, amid the fallout from the Supreme Court decision gutting the Voting Rights Act and the never-ending ridiculousness of gerrymandering.

The Contrarian has reported on the ruling and many reasons it sparked great concern. I have a different focus. At They Stand Corrected, my podcast and newsletter fact checking the news, I track what the mainstream media gets wrong or leaves out of big stories. It’s a lot.

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In this story, there have been gaping holes. At issue in this case was a majority-Black Louisiana district. The coverage has ignored an important piece of the history: the times white Republicans have teamed up with Black Democrats to create majority-Black districts.

It’s been called an “unholy alliance,” or “strange bedfellows” — a term I used on NPR when covering a 1990s redistricting battle in Georgia. The math makes sense. Black voters overwhelmingly supported Democrats (and still do). By gathering many together in a single district, Republicans could keep them out of other districts, making those “safer” for Republicans. Some Democrats, meanwhile, fought to break up those majority-Black districts to disperse the votes.

In a 1995 New York Times op-ed, civil rights lawyer A. Lee Parks wrote that the Supreme Court “found Georgia’s efforts to create black-majority districts through gerrymandering unconstitutional. Georgia asked the Court to sanction these districts as a benign form of discrimination. But the Court wisely held that the Voting Rights Act was not passed for the purpose of electing black legislators.”

Practices across party lines haven’t disappeared; they continue in new and different ways. The Louisiana Illuminator reported that Gov. Jeff Landry’s 2024 redistricting special session “brought together a set of strange bedfellows: Black Democrats, who wanted more minority representation; and white Republicans, who used the opportunity to unseat 6th District U.S. Rep. Garret Graves.”

To be clear, the fact that the parties have taken different stances on these issues does not erase the immediate concerns. The SCOTUS decision is likely to help Republicans redraw maps in time for the midterms and reduce opportunities for Black voters to work together inside districts to elect Black candidates. Currently, Congress’ website says 12.2% of members are African-American. According to the Census, 13.7% of Americans identify as African-American; another 3.1% identify as having two or more races, and some of them identify as Black.

Still, the potential impacts are more complicated than the media lets on. The decision could boost the GOP for the midterms, the Brookings Institution said. “But before Democrats panic and Republicans celebrate, both parties should consider the full range of possible consequences of this decision.” Breaking up majority-minority districts could reduce Republican majorities in some areas, making “formerly safe Republican districts competitive.”

America’s long history of gerrymandering has included maps like these.

Also missing in much of the coverage is how the electorate is shifting. Gallup finds a record number of Americans, 45%, now identify as independents, while 27% each identify as Republicans or Democrats (totals can be slightly above or below 100 because of rounding). Self-identified conservatives still outnumber liberals, although the gap has narrowed to 7 points.

Some analysts say independents are especially unpredictable. As this cohort grows, even areas cynically redrawn around traditional voting patterns are no guarantee of success. This past weekend, a Democratic-backed candidate won a mayoral race in a “red” Texas county. (Local Texas races are officially non-partisan as a rule.)

Both parties have a lot of work to do to win over voters. “Favorable ratings of the Democratic Party are no better than those of the Republican Party, and are among the worst Gallup has recorded for the Democratic Party historically,” Gallup wrote in January.

The rise of independents can spell opportunity. Even as partisan hacks try to wrangle the redistricting process to their advantage, they make a big mistake in taking voters in those areas for granted.

Most Americans reject extremism and want candidates who offer real solutions. As Third Way explained in March, “The margin that House Democrats enter 2027 with is highly dependent on running the right candidates who are representative of their district, who are laser focused on implementing an aspirational economic agenda, and who follow the moderate playbook.”

Some voters in every city and town are reachable. Just as Hungary built a broad coalition to beat a far-right party and its leader, the United States can do the same.

The coalition that delivered Hungary’s new conservative leader

It can work to unite Americans who seek sanity in Washington. New, even more partisan districts may make it harder, but they won’t erase the possibility. There is reason for hope.

Josh Levs is host of They Stand Corrected, the podcast and newsletter fact-checking the media. Find him at joshlevs.com.

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