Washington, D.C. –  Today, the Republican-led Georgia legislature has reconvened to consider Republican-proposed congressional and state legislative maps – all of which defy the federal district court’s orders. 

“The Republican-proposed congressional map is yet another attempt to defy federal district court orders enforcing Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act at the expense of Georgia’s voters,” said Marina Jenkins, Executive Director of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee (NDRC). “Should any of the Republican-proposed congressional and state legislative maps be enacted, the district judge should strike them down.” 

This fall, the federal district court ruled in the cases Pendergrass v. Raffensberger and Grant v. Raffensberger that Georgia’s congressional and state legislative maps violate the VRA and ordered the state to enact a new congressional map with an additional Black opportunity district. Similar to the proposed state legislative maps, Georgia Republicans are pursuing a congressional map that defies the federal district court’s order by, among other things, continuing to deny the opportunity to elect candidates of choice to more than 140,000 Black Georgia voters in areas identified by the court for relief and eliminating a minority opportunity district in order to create  a new Black majority district.

The National Redistricting Foundation (NRF), the 501(c)(3) affiliate of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee (NDRC), initiated these legal challenges in 2021. 

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