Want to Fight Today's SCOTUS Decision? Then Fight for the Georgia Supreme Court in May

The U.S. Supreme Court just gutted the Voting Rights Act. That means state courts matter now more than ever. The next big election is on May 19 — for two seats on Georgia’s Supreme Court

Today, the Supreme Court delivered a serious and perhaps fatal blow to the Voting Rights Act. As Justice Elena Kagan wrote in her dissent, a state now “can, without legal consequence, systematically dilute minority citizens’ voting power” due to supposed “updates” that “eviscerate the law.”

(Harrison Keely via Wikimedia Commons)

The result will be a wave of Republican-controlled states redrawing their maps to entrench Republican power by destroying majority-Black and Latino districts. This, in turn, might decide control of the House of Representatives in a future election.

The only high court forum that remains to challenge rigged maps is in state court. The same is true for protecting reproductive freedom or to stop future attempts to steal elections, as many fear Donald Trump will attempt this November or in 2028.

There is much to do, nationwide, to counter the damage that the court’s ruling will unleash. But there is one specific thing that everyone can do right now: We can help elect two champions of democracy to the Georgia Supreme Court, just three weeks away.

On May 19, Georgia voters will vote in two state Supreme Court races that have flown almost entirely under the national radar. These are among the most important elections for the future of the country this year.

Nobody is talking about this election. That needs to change.

For decades, in parallel with its drive to dominate the U.S. Supreme Court, the far right has run an intensive national effort to take control of state supreme courts. The consequences of this highly successful effort have been disastrous for the country. But over the past decade, democracy supporters, realizing that state supreme courts are key to protecting rights and securing democracy itself, have organized to flip courts in several key states.

After a year of Democratic wins in down-ballot races, the next big test is Georgia. This fight, in the home state of the great John Lewis, could not come at a more critical time.

The Stakes

If you want to see what we have to gain in Georgia with a victory next month, look to the Midwest. The pro-democracy coalition mobilized to elect majorities on the highest courts in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.

The past decade has already shown us what these courts can achieve. When states passed partisan gerrymanders designed to lock one party in power for a decade, state courts struck down the maps and drew or demanded fair districts. When Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization took away Americans’ right to make their own healthcare decisions, state courts filled that gap by protecting reproductive freedom under state constitutions. Most critically, when Trump sought to undermine the results of the 2020 presidential election, state courts stopped him in his tracks.

But the reverse is also true. A MAGA-aligned state supreme court can uphold restrictive abortion laws. It can rubber-stamp partisan gerrymanders. It can collude with election-denying candidates to throw out lawful ballots. The choice of which of these roads the Peach State will go down is up to Georgia voters on May 19.

The Wisconsin Playbook

The playbook for winning progressive majorities on state supreme courts is now well-established. Look to Wisconsin. At the start of 2018, a 5-2 MAGA majority controlled the state’s highest court. Since then, through strong candidate recruitment, always-on communication and organizing infrastructure, and a well-funded campaign and coalition — all united around effective strategy — pro-democracy candidates have won five out of the last six Supreme Court races and flipped the court to a 5-2 pro-democracy majority.

Wisconsin’s winning candidates emphasized high-salience issues such as reproductive freedom, refused to cede the issue of public safety to bad-faith attacks by the other side, and disqualified their opponents as far-right MAGA hacks in judicial robes. The electoral results show the power of this approach: double-digit margins in every winning race, even up against unprecedented spending from GOP mega-donors like Elon Musk.

The results have had enormous national implications. In 2020, the court rejected, by a 4-3 margin, Trump’s attempt to throw out all of the votes in Milwaukee and essentially steal the state’s electors. In 2023, the court struck down the state’s gerrymandered state legislative districts, paving the way to, in 2024, the first fair maps in a generation. Also in 2024, the court struck down the state’s 1849 abortion ban.

The Battle for Georgia’s Future

In the May 19 state Supreme Court election, former state Sen. Jen Jordan and former chair of the Georgia Association of Black Women Attorneys Miracle Rankin — both respected advocates for consumers, women, and those who care about civil rights — are taking on right-wing incumbents Justices Sarah Warren and Charlie Bethel.

The current majority on the Georgia Supreme Court has proved itself incapable of standing up to authoritarians and protecting fundamental rights. Warren and Bethel sided with Trump when the court affirmed a lower court ruling halting the Fulton County District Attorney’s prosecution of Trump related to his attempts to interfere with the 2020 election. That decision came down to a narrow 4-3 majority; if Warren and Bethel had not been on the court, Trump might have faced real consequences for his alleged actions. Bethel and Warren likewise have failed to stand up for Georgians’ right to reproductive freedom, twice supporting interventions to reinstate Georgia’s near-total abortion ban after a lower court halted the law, though litigation is ongoing.

A two-seat gain on the court this spring would immediately change the dynamics of the court. Moreover, if Jordan and Rankin win, they would open a path to winning an outright pro-democracy majority on the Georgia Supreme Court in spring 2028, when three more GOP-aligned justices will have to run for reelection.

Here’s the math: Currently, the court has eight conservatives (five extremists, three center-right) and a single moderate. Two victories on May 19 would bring the conservative bloc to six members, with three moderate-to-liberal justices. Three more victories in 2028 would mean a 6-3 moderate/liberal majority that, potentially, could last through the post-census redistricting process and beyond. Conversely, a loss in both of these races would mean a certain conservative majority on Georgia’s court through the transfer of power after the 2028 presidential election.

In other words, winning on May 19 is the only way to make a pro-democracy majority on Georgia’s highest court possible before the Congress considers the electoral college votes from the 2028 presidential election.

Gerrymandering and Fair Maps

Because of its impact on redistricting questions, the May 19 election will affect the national House majority for years to come, especially after today.

Today’s disastrous decision from the U.S. Supreme Court in Louisiana v. Callais gives Georgia’s Republican legislature an unprecedented opportunity to break up Black and Latino-majority districts and make their already severely gerrymandered maps even less fair as soon as this year. The federal courts’ abdication of their role in policing gerrymandering makes state courts the only forum left for litigants seeking fair maps.

The possibility of divided government in Georgia after November’s election makes this court even more important. If the governor and state legislature cannot agree on maps, map drawing falls to the courts. If Democrats win the governorship this fall, such an impasse is nearly certain. Simply put, the composition of the Georgia Supreme Court is the difference between fair maps and rigged maps that systematically dilute the voting power of Black and other minority voters. This could decide control of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Moreover, the consequences will last beyond this decade.

After the 2030 census (in which Georgia could expand from 14 to 15 U.S. House members), every state will adopt new maps intended to last through 2042. A pro-democracy court majority in Georgia could block gerrymandered maps or draw fair ones that could shape the U.S. House majority for the next 16 years.

Election Subversion

The Trump administration’s attempts to seize ballots from the 2020 election in Fulton County show that Georgia will be ground zero for election subversion in 2026 and 2028. In the 2028 presidential election, Georgia may not enjoy the same democratic backstops it had in 2020, including a secretary of state unwilling to “find 11,780 votes.” We need a majority ready to stop future election subversion — like the Wisconsin Supreme Court did in 2020. Any other outcome could be catastrophic.

A victory this month could yield positive results as soon as this year’s elections. If the two incumbents lose, that will put the rest of the court on notice. With the cost of partisan rulings in favor of election deniers unmistakably high, there is a much stronger chance that the high court will side in favor of free and fair elections, if only out of a sense of electoral self-preservation.

Reproductive Freedom: An Oasis in the South

Finally, the importance of reproductive freedom in this race is not isolated to Georgia. Georgia, with its six-week abortion ban, is in a sea of deep-red states with laws that are similarly hostile to reproductive freedom. A theoretical favorable ruling on abortion in Georgia by a future court, therefore, would create a potential oasis within the Deep South for those who need reproductive healthcare from states like Alabama, Mississippi, South Carolina, Florida, Louisiana, and Texas.

Democrats are on a roll — but in this race, the GOP has a turnout machine

Last fall, Georgia voters astonished the nation by electing Democrats to their state’s Public Service Commission by a 20-point margin. Six months later, in equally purple Wisconsin, voters elected a former Democratic state legislator to their state Supreme Court by an equally massive landslide. But in Georgia this spring, we can’t expect Democratic turnout to take care of victory by itself. Republican voters are likely to turn out in droves for the GOP’s gubernatorial primary taking place on the same day.

Georgia has two candidates for the Republican nomination for governor who are spending tens of millions of dollars on ads to win their contest. This intensive investment is likely to drive up GOP turnout. No comparable level of spending can be found on the Democratic side. This gives the GOP an advantage in getting voters to the polls — and makes this state supreme court election, which will be voted on in the same ballots that are used in the partisan primaries, a potential tossup.

What You Can Do

The stakes are too high for Georgia voters — and for the rest of the country — to sit this one out.

• If you live in Georgia, make a plan to vote (and urge your friends and family to do the same). If you live in Georgia, check your registration status, find your polling place, and make sure everyone you know understands the importance of these down-ballot races. Early voting continues until May 15. You can find all the information you need to vote here.

• Donate to the candidates and other organizations supporting them. These races are expensive, and the opponents have deep-pocketed conservative backing. Your support helps get the pro-democracy message out.

• Spread the word. This race lacks the profile of a presidential or gubernatorial contest — but its importance is no less enormous. Share this piece and anything else you can about this race and help ensure that progressive and pro-democracy voters show up.

Given the public’s fury about the Trump administration’s disastrous policies — on everything from affordability to immigration to war — there is every possibility that 2026 and 2028 will be wave elections on par with 2006 and 2008. But we can already see that the Trump administration and its allies in the other branches of government hope to thwart the power of voters by sabotaging democracy itself. The question of whether any future plots succeed or fail won’t be determined only on November election days. That question will be determined by what each of us does when looking at elections like the Georgia race on May 19.

Let’s seize the moment — and start moving this critical court to the “pro democracy” side of the ledger.

Ben Wikler is the former chair of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and author of the forthcoming This Is The Plan: How to End America’s Meltdown and Save Democracy. Lavora Barnes is the former chair of the Michigan Democratic Party. Spencer Klein is a senior political adviser and associate general counsel at Democracy Defenders Action.

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