The Supreme Court will hear arguments next week in a case that challenges a key provision of the federal Voting Rights Act that seemingly allows for and encourages state legislatures to engage in  the racial gerrymandering of congressional districts, which has historically benefited Democrats.

Democrat-aligned activist groups are now sounding the alarm that, if the Supreme Court ultimately strikes down Section 2 of the VRA, Republicans could gain up to 19 additional formerly Democrat-held seats in the House of Representatives, according to Breitbart.

The activists further warned that those potential 19 flipped seats, in conjunction with mid-decade redistricting in red states that could flip eight more Democratic seats and create another half dozen new battleground districts nationwide, could result in the GOP locking in a solid majority in Congress for decades to come.

Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act at risk

On October 15, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments in a rehearing of the case of Louisiana v. Callais, which asks the justices to consider "Whether Louisiana’s intentional creation of a second majority-minority congressional district violates the 14th or 15th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution."

At issue here is a court-ordered redrawing of the state's congressional map, under the auspices of Section 2 of the VRA, to deliberately create no less than two majority black districts in Louisiana, one of which is an absurd gerrymander that snakes through the state and connects distant majority black communities from Shreveport in the northwest to Baton Rouge in the southeast.

The overtly race-based decision was challenged as a violation of the Constitution's equal protection clause, and many court watchers and legal experts believe that a majority of the Supreme Court justices are poised to strike down Section 2 of the VRA as blatantly unconstitutional.

Here's what could happen

Politico reported that two Democrat-aligned voting rights activist groups, Fair Fight Action and the Black Votes Matter Fund, have now issued a dire warning about the likely implications of a Supreme Court ruling that strikes down or significantly narrows Section 2 of the VRA and its race-based gerrymandering that Democrats have relied upon for decades to gain and hold congressional seats.

In a recent 16-page report, the groups predicted that "a ruling gutting Section 2 could help secure an additional 27 safe Republican U.S. House seats when compared to the 2024 House maps -- at least 19 directly tied to the loss of Section 2."

In practical terms, such a decision would allow all states to redraw their congressional district maps without explicitly taking racial or ethnic minorities into account, which could result in some majority-minority communities being split among separate majority white districts or packed together into single districts.

That could spell electoral doom for upwards of 30% of the Democrats' Congressional Black Caucus, or up to 16 of its 62 members, and around 11% of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, or as many as five of its 43 members, the groups predicted.

The report went on to provide a breakdown of each individual predominately southern state where currently Democrat-held seats could be targeted, and projected that as many as 33 seats could be flipped to the Republicans -- including 19 via the scuttling of Section 2's racial gerrymanders, another eight through the unusual but not unprecedented mid-decade redistricting efforts in some red states, and the creation of six new battleground districts that could go either way.

Proposed "solutions" for Democrats

To be sure, it is not a given that the Supreme Court will strike down Section 2 of the VRA, and even if it does, it seems unlikely that the decision will be handed down with sufficient time for states to alter their district maps ahead of the 2026 election.

In the end, the leftist advocacy groups urged Democrat-led states to engage in their own "aggressive" partisan gerrymandering ahead of 2026 to try to negate as many potential GOP pickups as possible, and for the Democratic Party to focus all of its efforts on reclaiming the House and Senate majorities in next year's midterms.

If that goal of majority control of either or both chambers is achieved, Democrats should then focus on passing legislation to counter or limit Republican redistricting, launch investigations of "unfair" GOP district maps, and impose various reforms and purported "accountability" on the Supreme Court and its conservative-leaning majority.