The U.S. Supreme Court considered Tuesday whether Alabama must draw a second heavily Black congressional district.

The case could deliver a fresh blow to the Voting Rights Act, the 1965 law designed to protect minority voters at the ballot box.

Tuesday, plaintiffs in the case, and advocates for increased congressional representation of the state’s Black population, gathered in Washington, D.C., and held a short press conference.

“It is because of the Supreme Court that the Voting Rights Act of 1965 is currently on life support as states across this nation, race to restrict voter access. The effect of their decision is to further dilute our power and to silence the voices of the minority,” said Rep. Terri Sewell, who represents the state’s 7th Congressional District, the only majority-Black district in the state.

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Evan Milligan, the lead plaintiff in Milligan vs. Merrill, stood with a small group holding signs that read “Fight for fair maps.”

Milligan said the group was comprised of a country singer, a new law students, a sought-after political consultant, a civil rights advocate, a mix of religious and nonreligious people, veterans and anti-war activists.

“We model a type of diversity that we’re very proud of in our state. We model connection to leadership, development, traditions, to advocacy traditions. We don’t always think the same way,” Milligan said. “It’s really important to affirm that diversity, because it actually gives us something to be hopeful for.”

He and the other plaintiffs have argued that Alabama’s current congressional maps violate the Voting Rights Act. A three-judge panel, including two Trump-appointees, previously ruled unanimously that the state had likely violated the Voting Rights Act and wrote that Alabama should have more than one district in which Black voters make up the majority of the electorate.

A 5-4 Supreme Court decision in February allowed this year’s congressional elections to take place using the disputed map, writing that it was too close to primary elections to make changes.

Alabama’s Black population is about 27%, yet most Black voters only make up the majority in one Congressional district,. Those who oppose the map claim that other communities, including the Black belt and the city of Montgomery, are fragmented, making it difficult for voters to effectively elect candidates of their choice throughout the state.

“Out of the seven congressional seats, we only have one and while I am proud to hold that one, I know that my state should have more than one majority minority district,” Sewell said. “It deserves at least two.”

Sewell’s district spans parts of Birmingham, Montgomery and Selma. It has a history of electing Black Democrats to its House seat that spans decades.

Davin Rosborough, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU Voting Rights Project, said it was “amazing” that Alabama’s defense said the state’s maps have not changed much in the last 50 years.

“In the early 1970s, George Wallace was governor, Alabama had an all-white state legislature, and it would be 20 more years until Alabama had even one African American congressional representative,” Rosborough said. “It was litigation in the early ‘90s that produced even one district that in which Black Alabamians could elect a candidate of choice. And so now when Alabama wants to go back in time and entrench discriminatory districts forever, I mean, we should take them at their word.”

Sewell added that she has seen the need for more representation of minority voters in the state’s needs firsthand during her time in the U.S. House.

“Infrastructure is not just roads and bridges. It’s broadband and water and sewer — the most important things that are needed in the Black belt,” Sewell said. “So, I know that fair representation matters.”

The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to make a decision on Milligan vs. Merrill in June.

Sarah Swetlik is a gender and politics reporter at AL.com. She is supported through a partnership with Report for America. Contribute to support the team here.