So, the Supreme Court is back at it, and this time, they continue to chip away at the cornerstone of the Voting Rights Act.
They just allowed a ruling to stay in place that strips advocacy groups of their power to enforce Section 208—the very rule that guarantees voters with disabilities or reading barriers the right to get help.
If someone needs an interpreter or a helping hand from someone they trust at the polls, the road has just gotten terrifyingly bumpy.
According to reports from NPR, on Monday, the high court decided not to take up a lawsuit from Arkansas, effectively allowing a previous ruling from an appeals panel in 2025 to remain in place. This outcome is pivotal because it strips away a crucial safeguard that had been in place to protect minority voters from discrimination in seven predominantly Midwestern states, including Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota and South Dakota.
The ruling specifically addressed Section 208 of the Voting Rights Act, which traditionally empowered private individuals and organizations to sue in order to ensure that voters with disabilities or those who struggle with reading and writing can receive assistance from someone of their choice while casting their ballots.
This latest move by the Supreme Court comes less than two months after its conservative supermajority dropped a major ruling that further weakened the Voting Rights Act, a decision that paved the way for a wave of redistricting efforts to erupt across the country, clearly signaling that states could now redraw district lines with even less oversight.
For decades, the enforcement of sections like these of the Voting Rights Act has largely relied on private citizens and groups that have stepped up to file lawsuits when they observe unfair voting practices.
This grassroots approach has been crucial in challenging discriminatory laws and ensuring that the rights of voters are protected, but a shift occurred in 2021 when Conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch raised eyebrows by questioning whether individuals had the standing to sue under this pivotal law. Following his remarks, several Republican officials across the country have seized upon this idea, proposing a new legal interpretation that suggests only the U.S. attorney general should have the authority to initiate lawsuits related to these sections.
If this interpretation gains traction, it could drastically limit the number of voting rights lawsuits filed because the Justice Department is often constrained by resources and fluctuating political priorities: they simply cannot match the proactive efforts of private citizens and advocacy groups.
The case the justices chose not to hear was brought by Arkansas United, an immigrant advocacy group that has provided Spanish-language interpreters at polling places to help voters who struggle with English. The group challenged an Arkansas law that prevents anyone who isn’t a poll worker from helping more than six voters with their ballots.
In 2022, a federal judge decided that this state law goes against Section 208 of the Voting Rights Act, but after state officials from the GOP appealed the decision, a panel from the 8th Circuit ruled last year that private organizations like Arkansas United do not have the right to file this type of lawsuit.
The 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals is the only federal appeals court to upend decades of precedent by ruling that private individuals and civil rights organizations lack a “private right of action” to sue under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, per Democracy Docket, a digital platform dedicated to tracking, analyzing and reporting on voting rights, election law and democracy-related litigation in the United States.
The brief and unsigned decision, devoid of any dissenting votes that the high court released didn’t explain why the conservative justices decided against reviewing the 8th Circuit’s ruling in the Arkansas case, but NPR highlighted an interesting angle: Republican leaders in Arkansas pointed out in a court document from last month that no other federal appeals court has weighed in on whether private groups and individuals can actually sue under Section 208. They argued that this lack of conflicting rulings means there’s no real disagreement among the appeals courts for the Supreme Court to jump in and settle the matter.
Essentially, they’re saying there’s nothing for the highest court to clarify since everyone is on the same page – or at least that’s how they see it.
The Supreme Court’s decision not to take a swing at the Arkansas case on Monday has left what remains of the Voting Rights Act with a staggering blind spot. Surely many of us are left wondering what’s next in this ongoing legal battle for our rights, but the short-term implications are already terrifying.
This isn’t just about voters whose native language is Spanish trying to understand and maintain their rights under Section 208. It’s about the erection of an enormous and potentially generations-old barrier that can easily leave many Black voters whose primary language is not English out in the cold, too.
These rulings act in tandem to simultaneously limit access and diminish the representational power of our communities with roadblocks that will disenfranchise our voting for decades.
