A Landmark Ruling on the Voting Rights Act

[0:00] It's Thursday, April 30th, and one of America's most transformative laws might have just been transformed again. [0:07] We start here. [0:10] In a historic ruling, the Supreme Court limits the reach of the Voting Rights Act. [0:15] This is part of the effort of the court to move on from the burdens of the past, any consideration of race. [0:22] This could set off a race to redraw congressional districts across the South while voters of color sound the alarm. [0:28] It's a day of loss for black voters in Louisiana who have counted on fair maps. [0:35] We'll walk you through the ins and outs. [0:37] Meanwhile, the Pentagon asks Congress for money for a war that's still at a standstill. [0:41] A $1.5 trillion budget request that the Pentagon is putting forward, and that's a record. [0:46] The next steps, according to Pete Hegseth. [0:51] From ABC News, this is Start Here. [0:54] I'm Brad Milkey. [1:01] There's been a lot of talk this year about how states draw their congressional maps. [1:05] Just yesterday, Florida Republicans passed a brand new map that will almost certainly send more Republicans to Congress this fall. [1:12] That is what's known as a partisan gerrymander, specifically drawing your congressional districts to pack a bunch of people, in this case Democrats, into just a few areas, [1:21] and then stick the remaining Democratic strongholds in areas where they will be overwhelmed by Republicans. [1:27] The reason that has been the rage this year is, one, it's a midterm year. [1:31] President Trump asked Republican legislatures to do so. [1:33] But two, it's because the Supreme Court has said partisan gerrymanders are legal. [1:38] Politicians are allowed to favor one political party over another. [1:42] But the history of gerrymandering isn't just about Democrats and Republicans. [1:46] Traditionally, it's been used to marginalize racial groups, to use those same techniques of packing and cracking, [1:52] to diminish the impact of black and brown voters. [1:55] That is what the Voting Rights Act tried to address back in 1965. [1:59] 95 years have passed since the 15th Amendment gave all Negroes the right to vote. [2:07] And the time for waiting is gone. [2:09] Traditionally, it's understood that states run their own elections. [2:12] But here, the federal government was saying, enough with the poll taxes, [2:16] enough with the rigged literacy tests that only seem to be given to black folks, [2:19] and enough with these maps. [2:21] In 1982, Congress changed the Voting Rights Act. [2:25] States with large black and Hispanic populations were required to create congressional districts [2:30] in which most of the voters were minorities. [2:33] Because of this law, you not only had fewer congressional districts sidelining candidates of color, [2:38] eventually you had more districts that were so-called majority-minority. [2:42] We just now began to scratch the surface before we were trying to get to the surface. [2:47] Ethnic groups we're seeing themselves represented much more often in Washington. [2:52] The Supreme Court has just released a major decision. [2:55] Now, the decision could reduce the influence of minority voters. [2:58] Well, yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on a case out of Louisiana, [3:03] a case about maps and voting and race. [3:05] And in this ruling, they effectively changed half a century's worth of guidance. [3:09] A huge case of this term. [3:11] Let's start the day with ABC senior Washington reporter Devin Dwyer. [3:14] Devin, can you just refresh us on what this case was even about? [3:17] Brad, this is a very complicated case that you'll remember was actually argued before the Supreme Court last year. [3:23] It was argued twice. [3:24] It was so complicated the justices came back at it again. [3:27] And it involves how the map in Louisiana was drawn after the 2020 census. [3:33] And the issue at hand was really brought forward by a group of white voters. [3:37] They said that a court-ordered redraw of Louisiana's original map, which added a second-majority black district, [3:47] which is held by Democrats, was unconstitutional, violated the 14th Amendment. [3:53] The court had ordered the state, these white voters alleged, [3:56] to use race to add a second district impermissibly under the Constitution. [4:02] Race-based redistricting is fundamentally contrary to our Constitution. [4:07] It requires striking enough members of the majority race to sufficiently diminish their voting strength. [4:13] The map drawers said they were simply trying to comply with the Voting Rights Act, [4:17] which says, you know, you have to give all voters an equal opportunity. [4:20] But nevertheless, the white voters said this was wrong. [4:23] Embedded within these expressed targets are racial stereotypes that this court has long criticized. [4:30] They assume, for example, that a black voter, simply because he is black, [4:34] must think like other black voters, share the same interests, and prefer the same political candidates. [4:40] So this was a case at its core that deals with the collision of the Constitution, [4:45] which mandates equal protection for all of us, equal opportunity, [4:49] and the Voting Rights Act's command that there be no discrimination in effect, [4:56] in effect, in any voting practice, including how maps are drawn. [5:00] And so what the Supreme Court did yesterday in adjudicating this was they came down on the side of the white voters. [5:07] And they said in Louisiana that that second majority black district, [5:11] which has been occupied by Democrats, that was ordered to be added by a lower court, [5:15] is unconstitutional. [5:16] It was a racial gerrymander. [5:18] You can't do that. [5:20] And then, as you noted at the top, Brad, they much more significantly and broadly set out, [5:25] really, in the words of the court, an updated test for how maps can be drawn to comply with the Voting Rights Act. [5:32] And the bottom line is they really raised the bar to make it much harder now to challenge election maps [5:39] all around the country if they dilute the influence of minority voters and sideline minority voters. [5:46] Yeah. Help me understand this, because this is what makes this such a bombshell, right, [5:50] is that it's not just about Louisiana. [5:51] This is a new threshold for what the Voting Rights Act is supposed to do and what it's not supposed to do. [5:57] So, I mean, what's going to happen now that couldn't have happened a couple days ago? [6:01] Well, listen, I mean, it hasn't changed that our laws and our court precedents and the Constitution prohibit racial discrimination in voting. [6:10] So that is still the law of the land. [6:13] You can't use race. [6:14] You can't sideline minority voters. [6:16] But this was a dispute about how the maps are drawn and if, in effect, minority voters are sidelined in the process. [6:26] And what the Supreme Court said yesterday, Justice Samuel Alito has said, [6:31] now in order to bring a successful challenge, you've got to show, in his words, [6:35] a strong inference that intentional discrimination occurred. [6:39] So you don't have to prove intent. [6:41] You don't have to prove that a state, in drawing their map, intended to discriminate. [6:46] But you've got to show that there's some inference that could happen. [6:50] And that's a tough thing to prove. [6:51] I mean, anybody who's followed court cases on anything, I mean, proving a person's intent is stuff to do. [6:58] And lawmakers who draw these maps to favor their political party, to maximize the advantage for Republicans, [7:05] even if that comes at the expense of minority voters and their influence, that's okay. [7:11] So long as there wasn't some inference that there was intentional racial discrimination. [7:17] Why, Devin? [7:17] Because civil rights advocates are saying this is like a gutting of the Voting Rights Act. [7:22] Why did they rule this way? [7:24] What changed? [7:24] Well, for the conservative justices, Brad, this has long been a project to, you know, as you know, [7:29] from covering affirmative action and other issues, that they have sought to, you know, [7:35] stomp out any consideration of race in any context, anywhere, regardless of a history of discrimination. [7:40] And Justice Alito, writing for the court's majority, said that that applies in this case, that simply times have changed. [7:49] One of the passages that's drawn the most outrage from minority voting groups is he says that discrimination that occurred some time ago across the South, [7:57] as well as present day disparities that are characterized as the ongoing effects of societal discrimination, he says, aren't entitled to much weight. [8:07] He says, you know, that's basically that's a thing of the past. [8:11] So this is part of the effort of the court to move on from the burdens of the past, any consideration of race. [8:18] But I should say, Brad, Justice Alito explicitly points out that it is still okay for a court to order a map to have a second majority minority district. [8:28] But just the bar for doing that is much higher. [8:32] I see if you're going to bring that challenge. Where were the liberals on this? [8:34] They were despondent. [8:36] Justice Elena Kagan declaring, if other states follow Louisiana's lead, the minority citizens residing there will no longer have an equal opportunity to elect candidates of their choice. [8:47] The liberals in their writing and in the case of Justice Kagan, who read her dissent aloud from the bench, called this a grave moment for the court. [8:57] She said it was walking away from the intent of Congress for over 60 years to prevent any discrimination in effect in a voting map that sidelines and dilutes the influence. [9:09] In effect, she kept pointing out, nowhere in the law does it say that we need to consider whether lawmakers intended to sideline black voters. [9:18] She said it's all about the effect that these maps have. [9:21] Well, and we're going to talk about what that looks like in just a moment. [9:24] Devin Dwyer, thank you so much. [9:25] Thanks, Brad. [9:28] So with that, what does this actually look like in practice? [9:31] For that, I want to bring in ABC's senior national correspondent, Steve Osansami, who's based in Atlanta. [9:36] Because, Steve, I think it's worth remembering the Voting Rights Act was written and enforced with the understanding that Southern states were intentionally disempowering voters of color. [9:45] So what has been the reaction, especially from the South, to all of this? [9:48] I would say that in some corners of the South, when you're looking at most of the state legislatures down here that are run by Republicans, that there is a bit of sense of it's about time. [9:59] Obviously the right result. [10:00] They determined that the last map that was drawn for Louisiana was done unconstitutionally. [10:05] I live in Georgia. [10:06] They used to have to get permission from the federal government, you know, from lawyers in the Civil Rights Office and the Department of Justice. [10:14] Like in a way that Nevada or Wyoming didn't have to. [10:16] Absolutely. [10:17] That Illinois or that, you know, New York, that legislatures and governments in those places didn't necessarily need approval by a group of lawyers in Washington to make the kind of changes to the election system or to maps that they wanted. [10:34] And so, you know, there are a lot of people who will rightly argue that the conditions and the racism, the naked racism that existed in the 1960s when this law was created doesn't exist anymore. [10:47] That we've had a black president, that we have black lawmakers, that we have black election supervisors even in some of these same places. [10:57] And so there's this argument that things are better and this is no longer needed continues to fly in the face down here against still charges of racism in terms of how congressional districts are drawn. [11:13] I feel like that's why this is almost being seen as a Rorschach test, right? [11:16] If you think institutional racism in this country is gone or at least lessened. [11:21] Yeah, it's about time. [11:22] If you still think it's an issue, I imagine a lot of black Americans might think, what are we doing? [11:26] This is seen by many civil rights activists and many black Americans in the South as just this slide. [11:35] It's a day of loss for black voters in Louisiana who have counted on fair maps. [11:44] Our elected officials at the local level and at the state level will disappear. [11:49] This continuing slide where we are going to continue to remove protections and subtly make it more and more difficult for black folks to vote or for their votes to matter. [12:04] And that you add to that what's happening in Washington. [12:09] If you tell me that I got to be, I got to jump a certain height, I could probably do that. [12:15] Tell me I got to run a certain district, I could distance, I could probably do that too. [12:21] But if you tell me I have to be white to serve in Congress from Louisiana, I can't do nothing about that. [12:27] I need some help from my government. [12:29] We've heard from the Congressional Black Caucus. [12:32] We've heard from Al Sharpton. [12:33] We've heard from Ben Crump. [12:35] We've heard from the NAACP who essentially said that our democracy is dying for help. [12:43] And it stands in striking contrast to what we're hearing from the White House, which is calling this a complete and total victory for American voters. [12:51] But I want to underline something, Brad. [12:53] What has happened with this decision, this isn't just a one-off. [12:57] This is a continual hammer that the U.S. Supreme Court has taken to the Voting Rights Act that has weakened it and stripped it of the teeth that the law had that was intended when the likes of Martin Luther King were convincing America that our American democracy was not as fair as many people believed. [13:21] So what happens now then, practically? [13:24] I mean, do maps start changing? [13:25] I know Louisiana was at the center of this case, but are we going to see more map changes and how quickly could that happen? [13:30] I don't think it's going to happen for this election cycle. [13:34] Okay. [13:35] The midterms, you don't think, are like the thing? [13:36] Not really. [13:37] And I'll use my state, Georgia, as an example. [13:40] So we already are voting right now. [13:42] Early voting has already happened for a race that happens in May and by November. [13:48] And the legislature isn't in a position where it could make those kind of changes. [13:52] But next year, it's on. [13:54] We're watching right now state after state play games with the congressional lines, right? [13:59] We're seeing it. [14:00] You can draw a district to look any which way you want and achieve whatever goal you want. [14:06] We're seeing that happen, right? [14:08] We're seeing that happen on the left and on the right. [14:11] What we're talking about here isn't blue or red. [14:13] It's racial. [14:14] The chances of them killing that is so great. [14:19] And it's like, how are my children going to deal with it? [14:23] In November, we interviewed this woman. [14:24] Her name was Wilina Cannon. [14:26] You know, she was a civil rights activist who was shot at by the KKK. [14:31] She had a hand in getting the Voting Rights Act passed. [14:36] And she told us then, she died in January, and we talked with her in November. [14:42] And she saw this was coming. [14:43] And we were talking about this very day coming in our interview with her. [14:47] She said, this is how it happens. [14:49] You're on your way back to no voting period. [14:53] And they're going back in stages to take this, less voting places and make it harder you. [15:00] They don't say you can't vote, but they fix it where, in a lot of instances, you can't vote. [15:05] Soon, it's just super hard for you to vote at all. [15:09] It's super hard for you to get the representation that you feel you deserve based on the population that lives near you. [15:16] Her solution was just to underline to anyone who could hear her voice to do everything in their power to overcome all of this and vote. [15:25] to overcome what are no doubt going to be more roadblocks put in their way to the ballot box. [15:31] That's the thing. [15:31] I could imagine we see changes in the next months or years. [15:36] What you're talking about is really a generational shift that might have just taken place here. [15:40] Steve Osansami, there in Atlanta, thank you. [15:42] Thank you so much. [15:42] Always a pleasure. [15:44] Next up on Start Here, he's called the Secretary of War, but he got prickly when asked about the war. [15:50] We're back in a bit. [15:50] Yesterday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave testimony to Congress for his first hearing since the start of the Iran War. [16:02] Lawmakers had plenty to ask him about it. [16:04] So let's ask ABC's Chris Boccia, who covers foreign policy. [16:07] Chris, what was Hegseth there to do, I guess, and how did it go? [16:10] Well, officially, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was there to present a $1.5 trillion budget request that the Pentagon is putting forward, [16:18] and that's a record-breaking number and a 50% jump from last year. [16:23] So an eye-popping number from the Pentagon. [16:26] But certainly, the Defense Secretary knew that he was going to the Hill to defend the United States' war in Iran. [16:34] The topic of Iran, I'm sure, will come up today, which I very much welcome discussing. [16:39] One thing that came up very early was a cost of this war. [16:43] So approximately, at this day, we're spending about $25 billion on Operation Epic Fury. [16:48] Most of that is in munitions. [16:49] There's part of that is obviously O&M and equipment replacement. [16:52] By the way, that's not included in the $1.5 trillion budget request. [16:56] But that is their accounting of what this war has cost. [17:00] And plenty of experts and even some Republicans on the Hill have already said that that number seems dubious. [17:06] And lots of Democrats, interestingly enough, in the hearing, tried to discuss the economic pain that this war has cost. [17:13] Despite the president's promise to lower the cost of living, gas prices are up 40%, and inflation is soaring so much for lowering the cost of living. [17:22] And they tried to pin down the Defense Secretary on that to say, this war, we're talking about energy prices and prices at the pump, has cost Americans. [17:30] Well, and so obviously, it's like a fiscal meeting. [17:32] They're going to ask him about the costs. [17:33] Do they also ask him about, I don't know, like the strategy or the military aspects of it? [17:38] Oh, plenty. [17:39] And I think that that was probably more prominent. [17:42] How much has Iran profited from your administration lifting the sanctions on Iran when you started this war? [17:49] I can tell you, Iran is financially devastated right now. [17:53] Okay, well, they've earned about $14 billion. [17:56] And he says that this has been a massive military success. [17:59] And of course, that's been his chorus all along. [18:01] As the Pentagon chief, it should come as no surprise. [18:04] How many Chinese missiles can they buy for $14 billion? [18:07] Does that sound like winning? [18:10] They're not. [18:11] We're insuring and they're not buying Chinese missiles. [18:14] Okay. [18:15] And I think Democrats have often conceded that the tactical successes are unquestionable. [18:20] That what the military achieved from a tactical point of view is impressive. [18:24] And the amount of targets that they took. [18:26] I mean, I've seen some ratios that the U.S. and Israel took out targets in Iran at a ratio of some 60 to 1 between targets hit in Iran versus targets that Iran hit. [18:35] So very few people questioned what the military was able to achieve. [18:39] But strategically, I mean, that's the area that you saw Democrats focus on. [18:43] We had to start this war, you just said, 60 days ago, because the nuclear weapon was an imminent threat. [18:52] Now you're saying that it was completely obliterated? [18:55] They had not given up their nuclear ambitions. [18:57] The Iranians passed an offer this weekend to the Americans that, by all signals that we've gotten from the administration, is not satisfactory. [19:07] The Iranians have proposed separating the two files that have become the two sticking points here. [19:12] One, the Strait of Hormuz and the economic gridlock, which has created really economic warfare between the two parties. [19:18] And the nuclear file, the Iranians have proposed, as ABC has reported, that we deal with the Strait of Hormuz. [19:24] Basically, we unblock it because you have competing blockades. [19:27] The Iranians and the Americans have made it so it's fairly difficult to transit through the Strait of Hormuz. [19:33] So the Iranians have proposed carving that out, opening the Strait and kicking the can on the nuclear question. [19:39] Oh, just being like, hey, why don't we just both agree to get out of the Strait? [19:42] Right. [19:42] And we'll deal with all the other stuff. [19:44] And the Americans are like, no, no, no. [19:45] We also need to talk about the nuclear stuff now. [19:47] Well, and that's what the Secretary of State said. [19:49] Well, we got into this for the nuclear question. [19:52] That is why we are here. [19:53] And President Trump yesterday told Axios that he declined that offer from Iran. [20:00] The Navy's at the bottom of the sea. [20:02] The Air Force is never going to fly again. [20:06] We've got an amazing military. [20:08] Now they have to cry uncle. [20:11] That's all they have to do. [20:12] Just say, we give up. [20:14] Now, the nuclear question did come up to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth yesterday on the Hill. [20:19] And he maintained that their nuclear capabilities were, quote, obliterated. [20:24] President Trump saw Iran at its weakest moment, took an action to ensure in a way that only the United States of America could do with our Israeli partners. [20:32] And yet they still haven't given up the nuclear. [20:35] But he did say that their ambitions remain. [20:38] And that is a contradiction. [20:39] After Operation Midnight Hammer last summer, Hegseth said that their ambitions were destroyed by that operation. [20:47] So now he's saying that it remains and that their conventional shield, as he calls it, is a threat to the U.S. [20:53] And that was a circle that he was trying to square. [20:55] I see. [20:56] Right. [20:56] Like if they were saying last year, like, we knocked them back a decade. [20:59] And now they're saying, no, no, no, we can't move on from the nuclear issue because it's a really pressing matter. [21:02] Well, maybe a decade, maybe obliteration wasn't the thing that happened there. [21:05] All right. [21:06] Chris Baccia, covering foreign policy. [21:07] Thank you. [21:08] Thank you, Brad. [21:10] OK, one more quick break. [21:11] When we come back, golf, petty rivalries, macroeconomics. [21:15] I live for this. [21:16] One last thing is next. [21:21] And one last thing. [21:22] When you think of golf, you might not think of Saudi Arabia. [21:27] But for the last several years, the Saudis have been at the center of the most dramatic schism in the sport. [21:34] This beef is between the PGA Tour that we've all heard of and an upstart league called Live Golf, L-I-V. [21:41] Live started a few years ago as a direct competitor. [21:43] It poached the PGA's top players, paying them gobs of money. [21:48] The individual winner of each Live event gets $4 million. [21:50] The bottom line is there's infinitely more money available for these guys. [21:53] And here's the thing. [21:54] It was funded directly by the Saudi state. [21:57] Well, now, according to the Wall Street Journal, the Saudis are ready to pull the plug. [22:03] Now, on one hand, this is a huge sports story. [22:06] This was considered an existential crisis for the PGA. [22:09] They simply haven't been able to compete in terms of cash. [22:12] The only reason they haven't lost more players is because they banned rivals from playing in some of their signature events. [22:17] And because some golfers, like Masters champion Rory McIlroy, said they would not take a paycheck from a country that abuses human rights. [22:25] Like, I hate it. [22:26] Like, I hope it goes away. [22:29] And I would fully expect that it does. [22:31] At one point, these two leagues tried to negotiate a merger. [22:33] It didn't work. [22:34] Well, now the PGA has won. [22:37] Why did this happen? [22:38] Well, that's where this stops just being a sports story. [22:42] See, the reason the Saudis invested in a golf league is not necessarily because they love golf so much. [22:48] It's because petrostates that have made their fortunes solely on oil are desperately trying to diversify. [22:55] They know that one day, soon, that oil will dry up. [22:58] And before that happens, they're trying to reposition themselves as tech incubators, cultural centers, and as tourism hubs. [23:05] While sporting events make for great destinations. [23:10] Saudi Arabia's public investment fund invested heavily in Formula One racing. [23:15] They recruited Cristiano Ronaldo to join their soccer league. [23:17] The WWE is holding events there. [23:20] And it's not just the Saudis. [23:21] From Qatar to Bahrain to the United Arab Emirates, there has been an arms race in the Middle East to invest public money in foreign sports. [23:30] But now, these countries are getting nervous. [23:32] Their consistent moneymaker, the oil industry, is under siege because of the war in Iran. [23:38] These investments have become a sieve for cash. [23:40] Do you know how much money you can waste on sports? [23:43] And good luck with tourism. [23:45] Anyone you know looking to fly into the Persian Gulf anytime soon? [23:48] The Saudis giving up on live golf would not just signify an errant shot. [23:53] It would be a sign the entire strategy might need a mulligan. [23:57] And as that Middle Eastern money dries up, there's a question of whether these golfers who jumped ship will even be welcomed back into the clubhouse. [24:06] It's all fun and games until the money stops flowing. [24:11] More on all these stories on ABC News Live. [24:13] In fact, I will be on there later this morning around 9.20ish. [24:16] I'm Brad Milkey. [24:17] I'll see you tomorrow.