Sixty years ago, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law what he called “a triumph for freedom as huge as any victory that has ever been won on any battlefield.” That law—the Voting Rights Act of 1965—helped dismantle Jim Crow, outlawed literacy tests and poll taxes, and opened the doors of democracy to millions of Black Americans.

But in 2025, the law is in danger of becoming a hollow shell.

As the VRA marked its 60th anniversary on Wednesday, it did so under siege. In courtrooms, statehouses, and even the Supreme Court, conservatives are orchestrating a full-scale rollback. Their goal, in the words of Texas Rep. Sylvia Garcia, is blunt: “The long-term game is to repeal the Voting Rights Act.”

Garcia’s warning came during testimony against a Trump-backed mid-decade redistricting effort in Texas, a plan designed to cement five new Republican seats in the U.S. House by dismantling districts held by minority Democrats like Reps. Al Green and Greg Casar. “They are thumbing their noses at the Voting Rights Act,” said former Attorney General Eric Holder.

Texas is just the tip of the spear. The law that once transformed the South by expanding the franchise for Black voters is being slowly dismembered—not by overt racism, but by courts and politicians claiming neutrality while designing maps that dilute nonwhite votes and disguise race-based disenfranchisement as partisan politics.

A legacy unraveling

Since its passage in 1965, the Voting Rights Act delivered sweeping change. Black registration rates in the South jumped from 31% to 73%. The number of Black elected officials exploded. And Congress repeatedly expanded its reach, extending protections to Hispanic, Native American, and Asian-American voters.

But starting in 2013, with the Supreme Court’s Shelby County v. Holder decision, the tide began to reverse. In Shelby, Chief Justice John Roberts gutted the VRA’s preclearance provision, arguing that “things have changed dramatically” since 1965. States with histories of discrimination no longer needed federal approval before altering their voting laws.

Since that ruling, the Brennan Center for Justice reports, 31 states have passed at least 115 restrictive voting laws. Forty-four of those laws were enacted in states that previously required federal preclearance. Racial gerrymandering, voter ID restrictions, and polling place closures have followed.

Roberts assured the public that Section 2 of the VRA—its permanent ban on racial discrimination—remained intact. But the Court has been chipping away at that too.

In Brnovich v. DNC (2021), the Court made it harder to challenge discriminatory laws. In Rucho v. Common Cause (2019), it ruled that federal courts can’t intervene in partisan gerrymandering—allowing lawmakers to use “partisan intent” as a legal shield against racial manipulation. That doctrine has since been weaponized to justify maps that clearly target communities of color.

In 2024, the Court upheld a South Carolina map that a lower court found was a “stark racial gerrymander.” The justices concluded the legislature acted out of partisan, not racial, motives—a distinction that has become the legal loophole of choice.

A dangerous new front

Now, the Supreme Court is preparing to weigh a Louisiana case that could deliver the final blow. After a lower court ordered Louisiana to draw a second majority-Black district, a group of white voters sued, claiming the new map violated their constitutional rights. Rather than issue a ruling, the Court delayed the case until next term—to consider whether the Voting Rights Act itself might be unconstitutional.

“No court has ever ruled that Section 2 violates the Constitution,” said Eric Holder. “But the way they’ve framed this question is dangerous. It’s the same argument segregationists made in 1965.”

Justice Brett Kavanaugh offered a foreboding signal in a 2023 concurring opinion, writing that “race-based redistricting cannot extend indefinitely into the future.” Many legal experts saw it as an invitation to end enforcement of the VRA altogether.

The courts close ranks

Lower courts have joined the assault. In 2023, the Fifth Circuit ruled that coalitions of minority voters—like Black and Hispanic communities—are not protected under the VRA. The following year, the Eighth Circuit took an even more extreme position, claiming only the U.S. Attorney General, not private citizens, could bring Section 2 lawsuits. Since 1982, over 80% of successful VRA cases were brought by private plaintiffs.

Though the Supreme Court has temporarily paused that ruling, Justices Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch signaled they would uphold it.

If they succeed, the VRA would remain on paper—but become effectively unenforceable.

A dim but urgent light

There have been glimmers of resistance. In 2023, the Court ordered Alabama to redraw its congressional map to include a second Black-majority district, resulting in a historic Democratic gain. But even that win was laced with warnings. Kavanaugh’s concurring opinion made clear that time was running out for any form of race-conscious redistricting.

Janai Nelson of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund says what’s happening in Texas should be a wake-up call. “It’s hard to be hopeful in this moment. But I hope people see the essential value of the law as a whole.”

As the Voting Rights Act enters its seventh decade, its survival hinges on whether Americans still believe in the right it was designed to protect: the power of every citizen’s vote.