Thousands rally in Alabama for Black voting rights after Supreme Court ruling

Thousands of people from across the United States converged on Montgomery, Alabama, on Saturday for the All Roads Lead to the South rally, protesting last month’s Supreme Court decision in Louisiana v. Callais that gutted the Voting Rights Act and severely limited protections against voting discrimination. They arrived by bus, car and plane to gather outside the Alabama state capitol building, in the same plaza where the 1965 Selma to Montgomery voting rights marches took place.

Organized by a coalition of national and local civic engagement groups, the rally aimed to rally opposition to what activists described as an assault on Black political power. Mayor Steven L. Reed of Montgomery, the first Black person to hold the position, told the crowd: “We’re here, Montgomery, not at a stopping point, but at a starting point. We’re here in this city because of the spirit, because of the courage and because of the commitment of our forefathers and foremothers who got us to this point.”

Following the Supreme Court ruling, Republican-led states have moved quickly to redraw voting maps in ways that weaken Black political representation. Tennessee and Florida have already passed new maps, while Alabama, Louisiana and Georgia appear poised to follow. Mississippi temporarily paused redistricting efforts, with the governor promising to revisit the issue soon.

Voting activists from states affected by Republican redistricting attempts joined local and national elected officials on stage, including U.S. Sens. Cory Booker and Raphael Warnock and Reps. Terri Sewell, Shomari Figures and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. They sought to mobilize and energize attendees.

“We need to fight with all we got,” said Charlane Oliver, a Tennessee state senator who protested her state’s redistricting by standing on her desk last week. “They may draw some racist maps, but we are the south, this is our south. The south belongs to us. The south got something to say, and we gon’ speak real loud and clear in November.”

Throughout the event, spontaneous chants of “vote, vote, vote” erupted from the audience. At times, the rally took on the feel of a worship service, echoing the Black church’s pivotal role in the civil rights movement. It opened with a prayer; when an attendee suffered a medical emergency, an emcee asked the crowd to “put their praying hands together.” Multiple gospel songs were performed during the day.

For many attendees, the rally was deeply personal. Their family members fought for voting rights. Now, they said, it is their turn to carry the torch.

“My grandmama, my momma, my mother-in-law – our ancestors did not cross that bridge, walk during the bus boycott, my cousins got locked in the First Baptist Church [in Montgomery], across from the police station in the 60s, my other cousin got beat up by a horse up on Jackson Street – we didn’t do all that for this,” said Carole Burton, a Montgomery resident.

The day began in Selma with a prayer service at the historic Tabernacle Baptist Church, followed by a silent walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, site of the brutal “Bloody Sunday” violence against civil rights marchers in 1965. From there, attendees traveled by bus to Montgomery, where thousands more joined them.

All Roads Lead to the South was not an isolated event – more than 50 satellite rallies were scheduled across the country for those unable to travel to Alabama. Speakers emphasized that the fight would continue elsewhere.

“Our task is bigger than defending the past,” said Rukia Lumumba, director of the Mississippi VRA Rapid Response Coalition and M4BL Action Fund. “Our task is to build a democracy worthy of the people who bled to create it in the first place.”