A three-judge federal panel on Thursday denied a request to block Tennessee’s redrawn congressional map, clearing the way for the new districts to take effect in the state’s Aug. 6 primary elections.
The ruling hands Republicans a significant legal victory as they push to lock in a 9-0 congressional advantage in Tennessee ahead of November’s midterm elections.
The panel, made up of two Trump-appointed judges and one Obama appointee, concluded that challengers failed to show the map was driven by racial discrimination. “At bottom, Plaintiffs won’t succeed on their vote-dilution claim because they haven’t presented meaningful evidence that race, not politics, motivated Tennessee’s May 2026 map,” the judges wrote.
Tennessee lawmakers redrew the state’s congressional boundaries during a special legislative session in May, following a U.S. Supreme Court decision in Louisiana v. Callais that tightened the legal standard for challenging redistricting maps on racial grounds. The new map carved Memphis and Shelby County across three separate congressional districts, effectively ending the lone majority-Black district in the state, which had been held for roughly two decades by Democratic Rep. Steve Cohen.
Cohen announced he would not seek reelection after the redraw.
Republican lawmakers said throughout the process that their goal was partisan, not racial. “Racial data was turned off” when drafting the map, attorney Taylor Meehan, representing Tennessee election officials, told the court. “The map was drafted for politics.”
The judges agreed. “The road to a reliably 9-0 map runs through Memphis,” the ruling states. “Thus, political motivations readily explain the map’s dilutive effects.”
Opponents had pointed to the map’s destruction of the majority-Black district, lawmakers’ use of census demographic data, and the unusual mid-decade timing of the redraw as evidence of racial intent. The judges were unpersuaded. “Plaintiffs present no direct evidence, weak circumstantial evidence, and no path for Tennessee to accomplish its political aims without producing the same effect,” they wrote.
Tennessee is one of eight Republican-led states that have revised congressional maps since last year, following encouragement from President Trump to redraw districts in advance of the November midterms. Trump has argued the effort is necessary to counter historical trends that typically cost the president’s party House seats in midterm cycles.
