On Wednesday, on Mobile radio's FM Talk 106.5's "The Jeff Poor Show," Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall discussed the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling striking down a racially based federal court-ordered Alabama congressional map from 2023.
The bench's Tuesday verdict follows its recent landmark ruling in Louisiana v. Callais, which now prohibits racially based congressional redistricting.
"The Supreme Court has acted, and they vacated the orders of the three-judge panel. What we have had filed since then is a request for a temporary injunction by the plaintiffs with a three-judge panel seeking to be able to stop what the Supreme Court has already done. We'll reply to that when they set that order. But feel confident in the arguments we're going to make," said Marshall.
"I do think we're going to see additional litigation filed in state court, maybe sooner rather than later," he added. "So it's going to be a busy week for us defending what Alabama needs to be able to do, and has long since argued that is to have the independent authority to draw its maps, not using race as a factor in doing so, and put Alabama on the same footing as states across the country."
Marshall explained the significance of the SCOTUS's Louisiana v. Callais ruling while praising Associate Justice Samuel Alito's decision in the case.
"In light of Callais, you know the fact that the Supreme Court came back and said, Hey, judges, we now need you to evaluate whether or not there's a section to violation in light of the criteria that we're setting out here. What it does, is it normalizes what is the argument that we made all along that is, rather than view Alabama from this lens of black and white, see it for what it is, and that is from Red and Blue," stated Marshall.
"We're a conservative state," he continued. "We're represented by conservative values, and we need to have the ability to be viewed from a lens that we want to have conservative representation, and I think that Justice Alito's decision sets out in a very strong way, very consistent with the arguments we've been making now before the courts for over four years about how we ought to proceed, very confident that, in light of the decision from last week that we'll be able to sustain what Alabama's legislature has done."
Marshall added, "We felt very good about the arguments we were making in light of the Callais decision itself, but by vacating, and that's the remedy that we specifically asked for, it basically says that the three-judge panel, your order now is set aside and you need to be able to go back to the beginning. It postures that case back to its beginning, and not as a result of any type of injunctive limits that the court may have set. I've got a great team. They've been working hard now for multiple years, trying to posture Alabama to be in the position it was yesterday. I think it's good lawyering, good work that we've done, and it's going to have an impact, not only in this case, but for years to come."
Despite the possibility of "rogue state judges" and targeted liberal legislation impeding the verdict, Marshall has confidence that his office will ultimately find success in its longstanding efforts to fight racially based redistricting.
"I think you could see a rogue state judge try to issue an order, which we have to go directly to our Alabama Supreme Court to try to be able to stop. But the good thing is the three-judge panel now, based on what the court did yesterday, I think it's been given a clear message that we vacated your order," he noted. "You need to go back almost from scratch now and evaluate the Alabama maps, according to our new analysis. New litigation may be that effort of the left to try to impede what we're going to do."
Concluded Marshall, "I think we're going to be successful in the end."
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