The NAACP escalated its fight against Tennessee's newly approved congressional redistricting plan Thursday, filing an emergency petition in Davidson County Chancery Court to block the map from taking effect. The civil rights organization argues that the GOP-drawn map, which dismantles the state's only majority-Black district, violates the Tennessee Constitution.
The petition urges Governor Bill Lee and the Republican-controlled legislature to halt enactment of the map, which carves up the Memphis-based 9th Congressional District currently represented by Democrat Steve Cohen. The redrawn boundaries threaten to eliminate the lone Democrat in Tennessee's nine-member House delegation, a move the NAACP says is a direct assault on Black political power.
“It is a direct attack on our democracy and our Constitution to dismantle majority-Black districts. A democracy without Black representation is not a democracy,” said Kristen Clarke, the NAACP's general counsel, in a statement. “Black communities in Tennessee have been silenced and brutalized for centuries. This is where the KKK was born and where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. Black residents were faced with racial violence and legal suppression every single day.”
Gloria Sweet-Love, president of the Tennessee Conference of the NAACP, echoed that sentiment, calling the map “unlawful” and citing a long history of discriminatory redistricting in West Tennessee. “There is a long history and contemporary pattern of unfair redistricting practices in rural West Tennessee that have harmed Black political representation,” she said. “We will stand up to make sure that Black voters retain their voting power.”
Lee signed the map into law Thursday after it passed both chambers of the legislature along party lines. The plan splits the 9th District—home to a majority-Black population—into three separate districts, diluting the influence of Black voters. Republicans defended the move by citing a recent Supreme Court ruling that allowed states to draw maps based on partisan advantage, as long as they are race-neutral. Tennessee House Speaker Cameron Sexton wrote on social media that the Court “opined that redistricting, like the judicial system, should be color-blind” and that states may redistrict based on partisan politics.
Cohen, who has represented the district since 2007, vowed immediate legal action. “Trump knows he HAS TO rig the game to keep his majority in November,” Cohen posted on social media. “And the TN GOP was willing to go along with it. It’s shameful. Next stop is the courts.” At least one Republican has already announced a challenge to Cohen's seat.
During testimony earlier this week, Cohen warned that redrawing the map to satisfy President Trump's push for Republican gains in Congress would undermine Tennessee's values. “They are giving up the values of the state … for one man who is president of the United States for two more years and maybe a little bit for the governor, who’s going to be governor for a little less than a year,” he said.
The NAACP's legal challenge is the latest front in a broader battle over redistricting in the South. The move comes after the Supreme Court struck down a Louisiana map that created a second majority-Black district, labeling it an unconstitutional gerrymander. Tennessee Republicans seized on that ruling to push their own map through.
For more on the fallout, read our coverage of the Memphis secession demand and the broader GOP plan to oust Cohen.
