That Result

The majority today loses sight of its proper role.  It is supposed to review the District Court's fact-finding only for clear error.  But under that deferential standard, the District Court's "plausible" (actually, quite careful) fact-finding must survive.  The majority can reach the result it does -- overturning the District Court's finding of racial line-drawing, even if to achieve partisan goals -- only by arrogating to itself that court's rightful function.  We know better, the majority declares today.  I cannot think of a reason why.

And this Court's eagerness to playact a district court here has serious consequence.  The majority calls its "evaluation" of this case "preliminary."  The results, though, will be anything but.  This Court's stay guarantees that Texas's new map, with all its enhanced partisan advantage, will govern next year's elections for the House of Representatives.  And this Court's stay ensures that many Texas citizens, for no good reason, will be placed in electoral districts because of their race.  And that result, as this Court has pronounced year in and year out, is a violation of the Constitution.

-- Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, with whom Justice Sonia Sotomayor and Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson join, dissenting from the grant of the application for stay in Greg Abbott, et al. v League Of United Latin American Citizens, et al. (4 December 2025)