Supreme Court Conservatives Seem Likely To Accept South Carolina’s Racial Gerrymander

The Supreme Court’s conservatives were highly skeptical on Wednesday of arguments that Republicans in the South Carolina legislature unconstitutionally relied on race while drawing congressional district lines.

At issue in Wednesday’s case, Alexander v. South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP, is whether a three-judge federal district court erred when it ruled that the state legislature had unconstitutionally manipulated racial demographics when drawing lines for the state’s 1st Congressional District, in an effort to achieve a Republican district in the Charleston region.