How the US Supreme Court Undermined Democracy in 2024

The U.S. Supreme Court wrapped one of its most consequential terms in modern history, handing down decisions that redefined the limits of presidential power and upended the wide latitude given to federal agencies to interpret laws. 

On the democracy front, the Court issued a decision raising the standard for racial gerrymandering claims against potentially discriminatory electoral maps, and another reinterpreting an obstruction law that could impact hundreds of cases against Jan. 6 rioters. Those decisions and others enhanced the scrutiny on the high Court, especially as some of its justices made news for ethically questionable conduct. 

The Court’s term may have ended but the cases will largely continue, said Thomas Wolf, an attorney and the Brennan Center’s Director of Democracy Initiatives. He urged people to watch how the cases develop. “The Supreme Court issuing rulings in many cases is just the next stage in a legal development, rather than the end,” Wolf said. “Even if the court never issued another opinion, the damage has already been done.”

Here are three cases that had a substantial impact on democracy this term:

Alexander v. South Carolina NAACP
May 23

Siding with South Carolina Republicans, the Court determined in a 6-3 decision that the state’s congressional map is not unconstitutionally racially gerrymandered, reversing a lower court decision that blocked the map’s 1st Congressional District.

The lawsuit filed by the state’s NAACP chapter against Republican legislative leaders centered on lawmakers’ decision to move over 30,000 Black voters from Charleston County out of the state’s 1st Congressional District and into the 6th Congressional District.

The new map packed Black voters in the 6th Congressional District, while diluting Black voter strength in the 1st, 2nd and 5th Congressional Districts, the plaintiffs alleged. A three-judge panel agreed in part, striking down the 1st Congressional District for an unconstitutional racial gerrymander last year.

In May, the Court found there was no “no direct evidence” that the Legislature relied on race when it drew the district, and that the evidence provided to support that conclusion fell “far short of showing that race, not partisan preferences, drove the districting process,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in the majority opinion.

The decision was slammed by voting and civil rights advocates largely because it seemed to raise the standard by which federal courts assess racial gerrymandering claims. The Court faulted the plaintiffs for not providing an alternative map — specifically one that demonstrates the state could have achieved its partisan goals without cracking the 1st Congressional District.

The ruling effectively turned partisan gerrymandering into a “Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free card for racial gerrymanders,” Wolf said. He pointed to the Court’s 2019 decision that essentially put an end to litigating partisan gerrymander cases in federal courts, determining in Rucho v. Common Cause that such cases are “beyond the reach of the federal courts,” the opinion held.

The Court said in Rucho that not allowing legislators to consider partisan interests when redrawing district lines would be a departure from what the Framers intended. “The ‘central problem’ is ‘determining when political gerrymandering has gone too far,’” the opinion said, citing a 2004 redistricting case.

“In 2019, the court said it didn’t have the tools, so it was taking itself out of the practice of policing partisan gerrymanders, all while decrying gerrymanders as being an obvious constitutional harm,” Wolf said. “And yet, just five years later, in Alexander, partisan gerrymandering is being presented as a legitimate government interest that can excuse racial discrimination.”

Fischer v. United States
June 28

In this case, the Court was tasked with interpreting a law criminalizing the obstruction of an official proceeding. The matter involved a man facing charges for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, during which a mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in an attempt to prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s win.

The rioter, Joseph Fischer, was indicted in March of 2021 on charges including obstruction of a congressional proceeding. He challenged the obstruction charge in court, arguing the law doesn’t apply to his case because it pertains to tampering with records, documents or other evidence.

The Court ruled in order to prove a violation of the statute, “the Government must establish that the defendant impaired the availability or integrity for use in an official proceeding of records, documents, objects, or as we earlier explained, other things used in the proceeding, or attempted to do so.”

The justices remanded the case back to the district court, where a judge is expected to reassess the case based on the Court’s interpretation of the law, which could impact hundreds of federal cases against Jan. 6 rioters.

In a statement after the ruling, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said he was “disappointed by today’s decision, which limits an important federal statute that the Department has sought to use to ensure that those most responsible for that attack face appropriate consequences.” 

Garland noted that “the vast majority of the more than 1,400 defendants charged for their illegal actions on January 6 will not be affected by this decision. There are no cases in which the Department charged a January 6 defendant only with the offense at issue in Fischer.”

United States v. Trump
July 1

In a ruling with wide implications for democracy, the Court ruled that former President Donald Trump is immune from criminal prosecution for official acts he allegedly committed during his tenure. The Court determined that while the president doesn’t enjoy immunity for unofficial acts, he’s at least entitled to presumptive immunity for his official acts.

“That immunity applies equally to all occupants of the Oval Office,” the decision said. 

The opinion stems from a federal criminal indictment against Trump in connection with his alleged effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, a scheme that culminated in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of Trump supporters.

It remains to be seen how federal prosecutors will proceed after the ruling. But Trump’s team almost immediately moved to postpone his July sentencing on business fraud charges. A New York judge approved the request last week, giving Trump’s team time to submit a memorandum arguing that the New York conviction be overturned, based on the immunity ruling.

On Wednesday, Trump’s legal team submitted a memo arguing that New York prosecutors violated the “Presidential immunity doctrine” by relying on evidence related to Trump’s “official acts in 2017 and 2018 to unfairly prejudice” the former president.

Speaking to Democracy Docket, Wolf said the immunity decision could incentivize future efforts to overturn elections.

“One of the problems with the immunity opinion is not just that it grants a president immunity for official acts,” Wolf said. “But it grants immunity for official acts to a president who also has the power to pardon people. And when you unite those two things, in one person, you create situations where presidents or aspiring presidents may encourage people to commit crimes on their behalf while dangling pardons in front of them. It’s an inducement to lawlessness.”