The Supreme Court's unsigned shadow-docket stay reinstates Alabama's 2023 congressional map for 2026, overriding a district court ruling that found it racially discriminatory.
The Supreme Court, acting on the shadow docket, issued an unsigned order on June 2, 2026, staying a federal district court injunction that had blocked Alabama from using its 2023 congressional map in the 2026 elections [1]. The stay reinstates a map that the district court, in a 78-page opinion, had found to be intentionally racially discriminatory in violation of the 14th Amendment [2]. The order was issued without full briefing, oral argument, or a signed majority opinion.
The case is the latest phase of Allen v. Milligan, a multi-year redistricting dispute in which Alabama has repeatedly resisted court-ordered remediation. The underlying action proceeded before a three-judge federal district court, which had enjoined Alabama's 2023 map after finding that it failed to comply with the Supreme Court's 2023 Allen v. Milligan ruling requiring the state to draw a second majority-Black congressional district [1]. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund represents the plaintiffs challenging the map [2]. Three justices, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson, noted their dissent from the stay order [1].
The Court grounded the stay in the Purcell principle, the doctrine counseling against judicial intervention in election administration close to an election date [2]. Critics of the order argue that invoking Purcell in this context effectively rewards years of deliberate non-compliance: Alabama has now cycled through multiple maps, each found deficient, and will nonetheless use a judicially condemned plan for an imminent election cycle [3]. The district court's injunction had rested on detailed factual findings, not a close legal question, making the stay's implicit merits determination notable. The order eliminates, for the 2026 cycle, the second majority-Black district the Court's 2023 ruling required the state to create [1].
The shadow docket posture compounds the order's significance. No reasoned opinion accompanies the stay, leaving lower courts, litigants, and legislatures without guidance on how the majority weighed the equities or assessed the underlying constitutional claim [2]. The stay does not resolve the merits; the litigation continues. Whether the Court will hear full argument on the constitutionality of Alabama's map, or allow the case to become moot after the 2026 elections, remains the central procedural question [3].