For Immediate Release: May 8, 2026
Contact: media@colorofchange.org
Washington, DC – “Four judges in Virginia overruled more than a million voters today and handed Republicans a victory they couldn’t win at the ballot box,” said Nadine Smith, president and CEO of Color Of Change. “The court threw out a congressional map that voters approved less than three weeks ago, locking in a Republican advantage heading into the November midterms and telling voters their ballots can be voided on procedure when the outcome is inconvenient.
This is the pattern. The Supreme Court guts the Voting Rights Act. Republican legislatures redraw districts in the middle of the decade to hold power. And when voters push back at the ballot box, a court finds a procedural reason to throw their votes out. The rules keep getting rewritten by the people losing the argument with the public.
Black voters have been on the receiving end of this for a long time. We know what it looks like when process gets weaponized to dilute our power, and we know what it costs when courts treat democratic accountability as optional. Virginia is part of a bigger fight, and that fight is not over. Color Of Change and the communities we organize alongside are paying close attention, and we are not going anywhere.”
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Color Of Change is the nation’s largest online racial justice organization. We help people respond effectively to injustice in the world around us. As a national online force driven by millions of members, we move decision-makers in corporations and governments to create a more human and less hostile world for Black people in America. Visit www.colorofchange.org.