Tennessee passes new congressional map eliminating state's lone majority-Black district

0:00 And now we turn to the nationwide redistricting fight.

0:04 Tennessee's general assembly today approved a new congressional map

0:08 that carves up a majority black district in Memphis.

0:12 Here's what some of the protests that broke out of the state capital looks like.

0:15 Louisiana and Alabama are also working to redraw their maps

0:20 after the Supreme Court ruling that weakened the Voting Rights Act.

0:23 Our Ed O'Keefe has uh made his way to Montgomery, Alabama.

0:28 Uh Ed, great to see you.

0:29 I want to talk about Alabama in a second.

0:31 That's where you are.

0:32 Um, but can you walk us through quickly what we saw in Tennessee today?

0:38 Yeah.

0:38 Democrats in the state legislature,

0:40 all they could essentially do today, Caitlyn, was protest.

0:43 And protest they did.

0:44 Noise makers standing on desks, marching out of the chambers,

0:48 some of them getting arrested by state police for their actions.

0:51 And ultimately Republicans in the House and the State

0:53 Senate approved a new map that, as you said,

0:56 draws Memphis out of a Democratic majority black district into three new

1:00 Republican districts that stretch over there to the western corner of the state.

1:05 Tennessee moving just days after the Supreme Court ruled that the Voting Rights

1:09 Act can be interpreted in different ways now and account less for race.

1:13 And so now all eyes turned down here to Louisiana and here in Alabama

1:17 where last night legislators in essence

1:19 started the process of redrawing their map.

1:22 The issue here is they have to wait for explicit

1:24 permission from the Supreme Court because of a separate case

1:27 that established the state's current congressional map that has two

1:30 Democratic seats that encompass encompass mostly black areas of this state.

1:36 Uh, and we spoke with the state attorney general, Steve Marshall, Republican,

1:40 who is also running for the US Senate,

1:42 about his attempts to convince federal courts to let Alabama redraw.

1:45 Here's part of our conversation.

1:48 Did the White House put you up to this?

1:49 We've not talked to the White House.

1:50 So, you've not gotten any call from the president?

1:52 I've not talked to the president,

1:53 nor have I talked to anybody from the White House.

1:55 What is the biggest misperception of all of this in your view

2:00 either here in the state or from the outside looking in

2:03 that somehow another Alabama should be treated differently and again if you

2:06 look at our numbers and you see the progress that's been made

2:09 in our state we are viewed from a lens of black and white

2:12 as opposed to most states being viewed from a red or a blue.

2:17 We ask about whether he sought White House permission because

2:20 remember the seven other states that started this last year.

2:22 Texas, California, Missouri, Virginia, Utah, North Carolina,

2:28 all in essence did it for partisan reasons sparked by the president's calls

2:32 to have Texas redraw their map and come up with five more Republican seats.

2:35 Now, the one guy here in Alabama who would probably get drawn off

2:38 the congressional map should Alabama Republicans

2:41 get their way is Congressman Shamari Figures,

2:43 who represents this city, Montgomery,

2:45 the birthplace of the modern civil rights movement in a district

2:48 that stretches all the way to the southwest down towards Mobile.

2:50 We talked to him about what this would mean for him and his district.

2:55 uh to put us in a place where they want to go

2:57 back to the maps that they uh that they drew back in 2021.

3:01 Uh I think is them attempting to rewrite history

3:04 and that's it's an attempt to uh act like

3:06 they weren't caught with their hand in the old

3:08 cookie jar um of of how Alabama u was, you know, in terms of the actions that it

3:14 would take uh to suppress uh the black vote,

3:17 to suppress voter turnout, voter registration efforts.

3:20 And that does not sit well here.

3:21 Uh people are not excited about it.

3:23 people are not um happy with the idea of this state legislature

3:28 trying to take us back to a place where we've been before.

3:30 I mean, the irony isn't lost on us that this is the place

3:35 where people marched, fought,

3:38 many gave their lives or certainly shed blood for more representation.

3:44 Mhm.

3:43 And here decades later, having gotten a second district in this state,

3:48 more representation for that community, it may now get taken back.

3:52 I mean, that has to sit really badly with a lot of people around here.

3:56 Yeah.

3:56 No, look, people are not uh not excited about it, right?

3:59 And not excited about that possibility.

4:00 Uh, but I do want to be clear.

4:02 Look, we are we're very confident in Alabama's u congressional maps

4:06 and that they will turn out the exact way they are now.

4:11 Again, the congressman says he's confident

4:13 the Supreme Court won't explicitly allow

4:14 Alabama to do what Louisiana and these other southern states are doing.

4:18 We wait and see.

4:19 decisions could come today, could come tomorrow,

4:21 may not come for a few more days after that.

4:23 Louisiana will act in the coming days.

4:25 Mississippi and South Carolina are also

4:27 making plans to eventually redraw their maps,

4:30 if not in time for this year, Caitlyn, than for the 2028 elections.

4:33 Yeah, Ed, I was just going to say,

4:35 I mean, the ripple effect across the country is stunning,

4:37 but also the midterms are just months away and all of this coming to a head.

4:41 Um, speaking of the midterms, I know you're in Alabama now,

4:44 but our viewers should know earlier in the week you were out

4:46 in Iowa doing some reporting on one of those big matchups up there.

4:51 Um, what did you find?

4:52 What did you hear?

4:55 Well, we we were there because the vice president was

4:57 there in essence kicking off his midterm campaigning for fellow Republicans.

5:02 And this is a state that in the past has been controlled by Democrats.

5:05 right now for the last decade by Republicans.

5:07 There are open governor's races, Senate races,

5:10 and at least three of the four House races are expected to be competitive.

5:12 So, there will be a lot of attention on the Hawkeye State.

5:15 One of the Democrats running for US Senate is Josh Turk.

5:18 He's a state representative from the conservative western,

5:20 mostly Republican part of the state, but he's a Democrat.

5:23 He's a paraplegic who was in the parolympics

5:25 four times on the men's basketball team.

5:27 So, we played some hoops and asked him some questions.

5:30 Here's part of the conversation.

5:33 You're running in a state that Democrats would like to win back,

5:36 but you're not North Carolina.

5:39 You're not Maine.

5:40 You're not Ohio.

5:41 You're not Alaska.

5:43 Right now, you'd be considered a reach state for your party.

5:49 You're going to need a lot of money though to make this happen, right?

5:54 Yeah.

5:54 You're not wrong on on these.

5:56 However, I'll disagree on the reach.

5:58 I think Iowa's absolutely in play.

6:00 I think the polling indicates that as well.

6:02 Mhm.

6:03 Rob, why has it taken everyone so long to realize that?

6:04 Then Iowa flies under the radar.

6:07 You look at a state that Republicans have won for the last decade.

6:10 Last time we were able to have somebody

6:11 in the Senate was my hero, Senator Tom Harkin.

6:14 And people look at us as a red state, but I say we're not a red state.

6:17 We are a common sense state that has masqueraded more red than than what we are.

6:21 30 years we elect Senator Harkin.

6:23 Uh we're a state that twice voted for Obama, three times for Trump,

6:27 got a more Obama Trump counties than any other state in the union.

6:30 And in Trump's last midterm, and to me, in my opinion,

6:33 been traveling the state for the last nine months,

6:35 significantly more energy now than even then,

6:38 we won three of the four congressional races.

6:39 I think people forget that.

6:41 And then even in 2022, which was a bad year to run as a Democrat here,

6:44 we were only 1.5% away from having

6:47 three of our six statewide officials being dims.

6:49 I've heard you talk about being a prairie populace.

6:56 Yeah.

6:55 What does that mean?

6:58 Oh, I thought they were both going to go in.

7:00 Yeah.

7:01 Well, uh, prairie populism to me, you know, Senator Harkin,

7:08 my hero, was a was also considered himself a prairie populist.

7:11 It's somebody that is fighting for the middle class, fighting for the workers,

7:15 fighting for small businesses,

7:17 fighting for rural communities, for small family farms.

7:20 It's we really do have a have and have not society right now and we

7:24 need more individuals that are going out there

7:26 and and and fighting for the little guy,

7:28 fighting for fighting for the middle class.

7:29 That to me is what what true populism is is always

7:31 your northstar being what is best for the middle class, for the workers.

7:35 And so for me, I feel like I have my north star is always what is best for Iowa,

7:39 what is best for Ians, and what is best for the middle class.

7:44 So again, state state representative uh Josh Turk

7:47 in a June 2nd primary with Iowa State Senator Zach Walls.

7:50 Good example of what it means to be a Democrat in 26 2026.

7:54 How to win a race.

7:55 We'll be tracking this one, Caitlyn.

7:57 Uh but as you know well,

7:59 observers believe Iowa could very well become one of the more competitive Senate

8:02 races and help determine the balance of power in the Senate after November.

8:06 All right, Edetoke, thank you for your reporting.

8:09 Uh it was notable you didn't have the camera right on your shot there.

8:12 So, had you not had he not outed you for not making it,

8:15 we would never have known.

8:16 Good job, my friend.

8:18 A few were made.

8:19 A few were made.

8:20 Not all of them.

8:21 Okay.

8:22 Okay.

8:22 I'll take your word for it, but uh we'll have to roll the tape on that one.

8:27 All right.

8:28 Don't give up your day job.

8:29 We'll see you soon.