Resource: POLITICAL PARTICIPATION - Case: Greater Birmingham Ministries V. Alabama

In December 2015, LDF filed a lawsuit on behalf of Greater Birmingham Ministries (“GBM”) and the Alabama NAACP challenging Alabama’s restrictive photo voter ID law HB 19. Although Alabama’s voter ID law was passed in June 2011, the State did not begin to implement it until after the Shelby County v. Holder decision in June 2014. LDF’s lawsuit maintains that the Alabama legislature intentionally discriminated against Black and Latino voters when it passed the voter ID law in 2011, and that it indeed has had a racially discriminatory effect on voters of color, in violation of the U.S. Constitution and the Voting Rights Act (VRA).