Hi there, everyone. It's 4 o'clock in New York.

More than 68 years after Martin Luther King pleaded, give us the ballot, and we will no longer

have to worry the federal government about our basic rights.

The beating heart of the Voting Rights Act was the subject of

debate today in the nation's highest court. And the justices appear to be on the verge of a

decision that could have enormous consequences for the upcoming midterms and for our very democracy.

At issue today, Louisiana's congressional map adopted last year with two majority black districts

in order to comply with curbs on racial gerrymandering put in place by Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.

The justices today are being asked whether race can be considered a factor in drawing maps.

Here is how Jinnai Nelson, the lawyer defending Louisiana's congressional

map, describes the stakes. Were Section 2 to cease to operate in the way that you just described,

what could happen? What would the results on the ground be? I think the results would be

pretty catastrophic. If we take Louisiana as one example,

every congressional member who is black was elected from a VRA opportunity district. We only have

the diversity that we see across the South, for example, because of litigation that forced the

creation of opportunity districts under the Voting

Rights Act. Every justice in Louisiana has been elected through a VRA opportunity district and

nearly all legislative representatives. The New York Times reports this, quote, without Section 2, Republicans could eliminate upward of a dozen Democratic-held districts across the South.

The plaintiffs are seeking to overturn the map and potentially bring down Section 2, argued that creating majority black districts amounts to discrimination against white voters.

Here's what Justice Sonia Sotomayor said about that.

My humble point is that the government has no business telling citizens in which districts

they may live or what voting power they bear actions.

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