The Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act this morning. Black women have been carrying this country on their backs for generations — organizing, healing, voting, and showing up even when the system refused to show up for them. Today is not the day to grieve. Today is the day to get to work.
This morning, the Supreme Court voted 6-3 to eliminate Louisiana’s second majority-Black congressional district and gut Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. Louisiana is 33% Black and will now have just one Black congressman out of six seats. Moreover, the ruling gives Republican legislatures across the South a blueprint to eliminate Black representation everywhere. This is a health issue — because political powerlessness makes Black women sick in documented, measurable ways. This article is about what we do now.
- The 6-3 ruling in Louisiana v. Callais eliminated Louisiana’s second majority-Black district and weakened voting rights protections nationally
- Political powerlessness is a documented social determinant of health — disenfranchised communities face worse outcomes across every health metric
- Black women are America’s most consistent voters and its most systematically underrepresented citizens in government
- Research on “weathering” confirms that racial disenfranchisement has direct physiological effects — accelerated aging, higher cortisol, increased hypertension
- The Voting Rights Act has been effectively gutted in practice — 70 congressional districts nationally are now legally vulnerable
- Organizing and voting are not just political acts — they are acts of collective healing and self-determination
This article continues our series on the health, strength, and political power of Black women. Previously: They’re Dying and America Has Decided Not to Notice — the national crisis of Black women being murdered with no media coverage. Today we connect political disenfranchisement directly to Black women’s health.
I want to talk to you woman to woman before I get into the analysis.
This morning, I read about the Supreme Court’s decision in Louisiana v. Callais. Six justices decided that the law designed to protect meaningful Black political representation is effectively finished. Additionally, their ruling hands Republican legislatures in Florida, Georgia, Texas, and every Southern state the blueprint to eliminate Black and Latino representation wherever it exists.
I know what you are feeling. Exhaustion. Rage. The particular kind of grief that comes from watching a system take something that was already barely enough. Furthermore, I know that Black women have been feeling this way for generations — and that every generation got up anyway and did the work anyway. That is what we are going to do today.
First, however, I want you to understand something that most coverage of this ruling will not tell you: this is not just a political story. This is a health story. Consequently, what happens to Black women’s political power has direct, measurable, documented effects on Black women’s bodies.
Political Powerlessness Makes Black Women Sick — The Science Is Clear
Disenfranchisement Is a Social Determinant of Health
The connection between political representation and physical health is not a theory. It is established science. Communities that lack representation receive less funding for healthcare, less investment in social services, and less responsive government at every level. Moreover, the stress of living in a system that explicitly devalues your political voice carries direct physiological consequences.
Research on what scientists call “weathering” — the accelerated aging of Black women’s bodies under chronic stress — has documented that cumulative racial burden contributes to elevated cortisol, increased inflammation, higher rates of hypertension, and reduced telomere length. In plain terms, being systematically excluded by the systems that govern your life makes you age faster and die sooner.
Dr. Arline Geronimus at the University of Michigan pioneered this research over four decades. Additionally, the American Journal of Public Health — the same journal that declared the murder of Black women a public health crisis in May 2025 — has published research linking civic marginalization directly to health disparities in Black communities. Today’s ruling is therefore not a political abstraction. It is a health intervention in the wrong direction.
The Connection to What We’ve Already Covered
Two weeks ago in this column, I wrote about the epidemic of Black women being murdered with no media coverage. The connection between that story and today’s ruling is direct. When Black women lack political representation, the policies that address the conditions endangering us do not get passed. Furthermore, the national database for tracking missing and murdered Black women — which still does not exist — requires political will to create. The Medicaid funding for Black maternal care requires political leadership that prioritizes Black women’s survival. All of it requires power. Consequently, fighting for representation is fighting for our bodies. They are the same fight.
“The experience of being systematically excluded from political power is not just demoralizing. It is physiologically harmful. Black women’s bodies carry the cost in measurable ways.”
— Based on research by Dr. Arline Geronimus, University of MichiganBlack Women Vote More Than Anyone — And Get Represented the Least
We Show Up. The System Does Not Reciprocate.
Black women vote at higher rates than almost any other demographic in America. In 2020, Black women in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin delivered electoral victories that shaped national outcomes. Moreover, in every election cycle, Black women’s organizing is credited for results that politicians then do not prioritize once elected.
In Louisiana specifically, Black women have anchored every civil rights organizing effort from the 1963 march on City Hall to the voting rights litigation that created the second majority-Black district now being eliminated. Furthermore, no Black woman has ever been elected to statewide office in Louisiana. Not one. We have organized for representation that the system has consistently refused to provide. Today, the Supreme Court put that refusal into constitutional law.
I want to name this clearly because it matters for our healing: what happened today is not our failure. We did not fail to organize. We did not fail to vote. We did not fail to litigate. Additionally, understanding this distinction — between our power and the system’s choices — is essential to our mental health and our ability to keep moving forward.
What the Numbers Actually Show
Louisiana is 33% Black. After this ruling, we return to one Black congressman out of six. Moreover, approximately 70 of 435 congressional districts nationally are protected by Section 2 — and all of them are now legally vulnerable, according to election law analysts who reviewed the decision. Those 70 districts represent Black, Latino, Native American, and Asian American communities for whom the majority-minority district is the primary mechanism of political representation. Consequently, today’s ruling does not stop at Louisiana. It redraws power across the entire South and beyond.
“We have organized for representation the system refused to provide. Today the Supreme Court put that refusal into constitutional law. But they cannot put our will into constitutional law. That belongs to us.”
— Denise Tureaud, Black Source MediaWhat Black Women Do Now — Six Practical Steps
Healing and Fighting Are the Same Work
The Voting Rights Act was not given to us. It was won. It was won by women beaten on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, by women who organized for decades against violence and indifference. Today’s ruling significantly weakens that victory. Nevertheless, it cannot weaken the understanding that produced it — that our power comes from us, not from them. Consequently, here is what we do right now.
What We Do Right Now
- Feel it — then move. Grief and rage are legitimate responses. Give yourself time to feel them fully. Then get up. Moving through emotion is strength. Suppressing it is not.
- Register today. Go to vote.gov right now if you are not registered. Additionally, text three people and help them register. The ruling eliminated a legal tool. It did not eliminate your vote.
- Call your state legislators. Congressional maps are redrawn by state legislatures. Find your representative at geaux.vote and call this week with one specific ask: a fair redistricting map that reflects Louisiana’s actual population.
- Support the organizations fighting back. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the Power Coalition for Equity and Justice are already planning the next challenge. They need resources. Give what you can.
- Protect your body in the meantime. Chronic stress from political trauma is real and physiologically harmful. Counter it deliberately — prioritize sleep, movement, and community. These are not trivial acts. They are survival.
- Talk to your daughters about this. Young Black women watching this ruling need two truths simultaneously: what was done today is wrong, and we have never stopped fighting. Give them both.
I am not going to tell you that everything is going to be okay. I do not know that. Nevertheless, I know this: Black women have survived worse than today’s ruling. We survived slavery and Reconstruction’s betrayal and Jim Crow and every other system designed to contain us.
Furthermore, we survived all of it by organizing, by showing up, by refusing the terms the system offered. Moreover, we healed each other through all of it.
Today is Wednesday. We still have work to do. Let’s get to it.
Denise Tureaud — Health & Wellness Columnist, Black Source Media
Denise Tureaud is a health, wellness, and personal growth columnist whose work focuses on the physical, emotional, and spiritual lives of Black women and families. She writes every Wednesday for Black Source Media. Her voice is warm, her research is thorough, and her commitment to Black women’s full humanity — body, mind, spirit, and political power — is absolute.