Today, the ACLU of Arkansas and the ACLU filed an amicus brief on behalf of the Arkansas State Conference NAACP and the Arkansas Public Policy Panel in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, calling on the full court to rehear a case that threatens to eviscerate much of what remains of the federal Voting Rights Act’s protections in the region.
The brief supports a petition for rehearing en banc in Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians v. Howe, a North Dakota redistricting case, in which a ruling by a divided panel eliminated a key avenue — 42 U.S.C. § 1983 — for private individuals and civil rights groups to enforce Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.
“Without the ability of private individuals and community organizations to bring Section 2 cases, voters across the Eighth Circuit will be left defenseless against discriminatory voting laws," said John C. Williams, legal director at the ACLU of Arkansas. “The Eighth Circuit is poised to become the only circuit in the country where Section 2 is essentially unenforceable. That outcome would be catastrophic for democracy.”
"The Eighth Circuit must reinstate voters’ ability to bring suit under Section 2,” said Sophia Lin Lakin, director of the ACLU Voting Rights Project. “Without this essential avenue, voters will have to wait until the Department of Justice speaks for them, if they decide to intervene at all. Especially in light of the evisceration of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division under the current administration, closing the courthouse door to individuals and organizations that represent their communities seeking to vindicate their rights under Section 2 leaves millions of voters — especially voters of color — of the right defenseless against discriminatory voting laws. We will not stand by while courts dismantle the protections our clients have relied on for generations. We will continue to advocate on behalf of voters and use every tool at our disposal to fight suppressive voting laws and practices."
The Arkansas NAACP and Arkansas Public Policy Panel previously bought a Section 2 case challenging Arkansas’s legislative maps. A divided panel dismissed their claims, holding that Section 2 contains no private right of action, but the majority left open whether Section 2 could still be enforced through 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Now, the panel in Turtle Mountain has slammed that door shut — ignoring precedent, misreading the earlier ruling, and eliminating one of the few remaining tools to fight racial discrimination in voting.
“We fought to protect Black voting power in Arkansas because our communities deserve to elect leaders who represent us,” said Barry Jefferson, president of the Arkansas State Conference NAACP. “Stripping away our ability to enforce the Voting Rights Act would take us backward and send a message that our voices don’t matter. We won’t stand for that.”
“This is about whether people in Arkansas and across the Eighth Circuit have the power to shape the laws and policies that affect their lives,” said Bill Kopsky, executive director of the Arkansas Public Policy Panel. “We are proud to stand with our communities and demand that the courts do their job: to protect, not erase, our right to challenge racist and discriminatory voting laws.”
The brief argues that the panel majority misread prior rulings and that the full Eighth Circuit must step in to avoid becoming the only federal jurisdiction in the country where voters are unable to bring cases to enforce Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. Currently, the Court’s ruling has shut off these protections not just in Arkansas and North Dakota, but also Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and South Dakota. Since 1982, every Section 2 case in the Eighth Circuit has been brought by private plaintiffs — not the federal government.
A copy of the amicus brief is available here.
About the ACLU of Arkansas: The ACLU of Arkansas is the state affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union, a nonpartisan organization that works in courts, legislatures, and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to all people by the U.S. and state constitutions and laws of the United States.