Welcome to the annual preview of U.S. Supreme Court civil rights cases from the Thurgood Marshall Institute of the Legal Defense Fund (LDF). The Supreme Court Preview: 2025 Term provides a snapshot of each case’s issues and potential impact on civil rights. This easy-to-digest summary underscores the importance of the U.S. Supreme Court, and other courts, to our lives and the future of the nation’s democracy. Since its inception, LDF has served on the front lines of civil rights litigation efforts, including arguing many groundbreaking cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.
This case concerns the constitutionality of Louisiana’s congressional map, adopted through Senate Bill 8. This case was briefed and argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in the 2024 term, but instead of issuing a decision, the Court issued an order on June 27, 2025, calling for re-argument in the 2025 term. On August 1, 2025, the Court directed the parties to file supplemental briefs addressing an issue that the Callais appellees raised, for the first time, in their Supreme Court brief (see pages 36–38). The Court narrowed the issue to whether Louisiana’s creation of a second majority-Black congressional district amounts to unconstitutional racial gerrymandering, when the map was drawn in response to a federal court’s finding that the State’s prior map with only one such district likely violated Section Two of the Voting Rights Act (VRA). LDF filed its supplemental brief on August 27, 2025.
In January 2024, Louisiana redrew its congressional map to add a second majority-Black district in response to Robinson v. Ardoin (later Robinson v. Landry), successful voting rights litigation brought by LDF and others on behalf of the NAACP Louisiana State Conference, Power Coalition for Equity and Justice, and nine individual Black voters. LDF successfully argued in Robinson that Louisiana’s 2022 map likely violated Section Two of the VRA by packing Black voters into a single majority-Black district, thereby diluting the voting strength of Black voters in the other districts. Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry and other legislative leaders decided that rather than accepting a court-imposed map, it was in Louisiana’s best interest to draw their own map that satisfied the VRA. S.B. 8 became law in January 2024. However, the legislators deviated from the map that was presented to the court: the new map protected powerful incumbents in Louisiana’s congressional delegation, including U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, while also uniting communities with shared interests along the Red River and the I-49 corridor.
On January 31, 2024, twelve self-described “non-African American voters” filed a lawsuit, Callais v. Landry, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana challenging this newly enacted congressional map as a racial gerrymander in violation of the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. They argued that considerations of race predominated the map-drawing process. The Robinson case Plaintiffs intervened in this new lawsuit, Callais v. Landry, as Defendants. Intervention is a legal procedure that permits nonparties to “intervene” in, or join, ongoing litigation to ensure that their interests are fairly represented. By intervening in Callais, the Robinson Plaintiffs aimed to safeguard the hard-won voting opportunities the S.B. 8 map made possible for Black Louisianians. They further sought to protect Supreme Court precedent that confirms it is not an unconstitutional gerrymander for states to fix VRA violations, even when the map considers other factors like incumbency protection.
The District Court’s three-judge panel held a consolidated preliminary injunction hearing and trial in April 2024. On April 30, 2024, it issued a 2–1 decision that Louisiana’s new congressional map violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and it struck down the use of the map for future elections. LDF and the State of Louisiana filed applications with the U.S. Supreme Court for emergency stays of the District Court’s decision striking down the map as unconstitutional, pending the case’s appeal. A stay pauses enforcement of a lower court’s decision. The Supreme Court stayed the lower court’s ruling pending the resolution of the appeal, meaning that the S.B. 8 map remained the operative map into the 2024 elections—and therefore, Black Louisianians were able to elect their preferred candidates in two congressional districts. The Supreme Court granted the emergency stay application because it believed that the map was struck down too close to the 2024 elections.
On March 24, 2025, LDF argued before the U.S. Supreme Court that the S.B. 8 congressional map that was in place during the 2024 election cycle should remain because it satisfied Section Two of the VRA and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. LDF advanced the position that the 2024 map fairly recognized the political power of Black Louisianians, who compose one-third of the state’s population.
LDF Redistricting Manager Stuart Naifeh, who argued the case before the Supreme Court, said in a statement, “The protections of the VRA and Equal Protection Clause were designed to prevent discrimination and ensure that Black voters are not shut out of the political process. This case represented an effort to turn back the clock and undermine hard-fought efforts to achieve a map that finally reflects Louisiana’s communities and provides an equal voice to Black voters. But there can be no question that the current map is lawful, fair, and should remain in place. The Supreme Court should not undermine lawmakers’ agency in remedial map-drawing nor the VRA protections that Black voters have been fighting for in Louisiana for the last four years—and across the nation for generations.”
Instead of issuing a decision, the Supreme Court issued an order calling for re-argument in Louisiana v. Callais. The request for re-argument signals the significance this case holds for the future of fair representation. Importantly, the current congressional map, with two majority-Black districts, remains in effect pending the Court’s decision. The re-argument presents another opportunity for the Court to uphold what two lower courts and decades of precedent have already recognized: that states must comply with Section Two of the VRA when drawing congressional maps, and that they have flexibility in the manner in which they choose to comply.
LDF will continue to fight for Black Louisianians, who deserve the same fair and effective representation as any other community. This case is about more than just maps—it is about the future of a multi-racial democracy and the mutual commitment to ensure that every vote counts and every voice is heard in the political process.
This case concerns access to the ballot and voter protection. U.S. Rep. Michael Bost of Illinois, along with two former presidential electors, brought a lawsuit against the Illinois State Board of Elections and its executive director. The lawsuit aimed to prevent Illinois from counting mail-in ballots that are postmarked, or certified, by Election Day and received within the subsequent fourteen days, as is consistent with Illinois law. Bost and the former electors argued that the fourteen-day extended ballot receipt deadline improperly extends the federal election timing, violating 2 U.S.C. § 7 and 3 U.S.C. § 1, because it increases the number of total votes cast in Illinois by counting “untimely” ballots. They argued that this in turn dilutes their own votes, in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. The lawsuit alleged that the extended timeline created additional injuries, such as campaign resource burdens and the supposed compromise of an accurate vote tally.
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois dismissed these claims, ruling that Bost and the electors lacked standing (meaning they did not have the legal right to sue). The District Court also rejected the claims on the merits. In a 2–1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the dismissal of the case on the grounds that voters and candidates in an upcoming election lack standing to challenge the state’s absentee ballot policy and that the allegations of voter dilution due to the later ballots were analogous to “generalized grievances” that any person could raise. The majority also rejected Bost’s arguments about specific injuries such as campaign resource burdens. The dissenting judge concluded that Bost was injured as a political candidate because the law increased his campaign costs. The U.S. Supreme Court granted Bost’s petition for a writ of certiorari.
This case is significant because mass voter challenges tend to disproportionately impact Black voters. Because voting by mail helps expand access to all voters, including historically disenfranchised communities, anti-democracy groups have consistently attacked absentee ballot policies.
This is a consolidation of two cases, Rutherford v. United States and Carter v. United States, arising out of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Both cases involve a district court’s discretion to consider non-retroactive changes in sentencing law as one of several “extraordinary and compelling” reasons for reducing a prison sentence.
Daniel Rutherford and Johnnie Markel Carter were both convicted of criminal offenses under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c), which mandates a consecutive, mandatory minimum prison sentence for individuals who use, carry, or possess a firearm during and in relation to a federal “crime of violence” or “drug trafficking crime.” In 2003, Rutherford was sentenced to 42.5 years in prison under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c). Carter was similarly sentenced to seventy years in prison for crimes he committed in 2007, after being convicted of three charges under Section 924(c).
In 2018, Congress passed the First Step Act, which prospectively reduced the mandatory minimum sentences for certain drug and firearm offenses under Section 924(c). At the times Rutherford and Carter were sentenced, Section 924(c) required judges to impose a twenty-five-year minimum sentence for each Section 924(c) violation. This resulted in the “stacking” of sentences, whereby individuals like Rutherford and Carter were sentenced to an exorbitant number of years that often resulted in life sentences, even for first-time offenses. The First Step Act eliminated the imposition of mandatory minimum sentences. In April 2023, the United States Sentencing Commission issued a policy statement declaring that when district courts are deciding motions for compassionate release, they may consider—as one of several factors—that an incarcerated person would have received a significantly lesser sentence under the First Step Act.
Rutherford and Carter both filed motions for compassionate release because the sentences they are serving differ significantly from the sentences they would have received under the First Step Act. They argued that the disparity constituted an “extraordinary and compelling reason” warranting a reduction in their sentences.
In both cases, the district courts denied their motions, relying on the Third Circuit case United States v. Andrews, 12 F.4th 255 (3d Cir. 2021). The courts held that treating the length and disparity of a pre-First Step Act sentence as an “extraordinary and compelling reason” would inappropriately override the decision of Congress to not make the amendments to Section 924(c) retroactive. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed the district courts’ denials of the sentence-reduction motions.
LDF, the NAACP, and Cooley LLP filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court supporting Rutherford and Carter. The brief shared the experience of a similarly situated individual, Eric Andrews, who was nineteen years old when he was sentenced to 311 years in prison under 18 U.S.C. § 924(c). The brief argued that the Third Circuit erred and that the First Step Act did not limit a district court’s ability to exercise its discretion when determining what constitutes an “extraordinary and compelling reason” to reduce an individual’s sentence. The brief further argued that Congress intended for district courts to be allowed to reduce the term of imprisonment for people currently serving harsh sentences. By imposing only one limit (i.e., “rehabilitation alone”) on a district court’s evaluation of what qualifies as “extraordinary and compelling,” Congress necessarily excluded other limits (e.g., non-retroactive changes in law) that cannot be read into the statute. The brief argued that this demonstrates Congress’s intent to preserve broad judicial discretion.
In the United States, where sentencing disparities disproportionately affect Black communities, district courts must be able to exercise their discretion to remedy unjust sentences. LDF Assistant Counsel Jory Burks said, “For too long, Black people have faced lengthy, unjust, and disproportionate prison sentences that they would not receive under today’s laws. There have been important steps to address these racial disparities and harsh sentencing schemes, but we must still secure justice and provide resentencing for those who are still enduring draconian prison sentences.”
This case concerns Damon Landor, a devout Rastafarian who made a Nazarite vow to grow his hair without cutting it and did so for nearly twenty years. However, three weeks before Landor completed a five-month state prison sentence in Louisiana in 2020, prison officials handcuffed him to a chair, held him down, cut off his locs, and shaved his head bare, despite his attempts to explain his religious beliefs. Landor even provided a prison guard with a copy of a unanimous ruling by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit striking down the state’s policy regarding locs and holding that incarcerated people in Louisiana must be permitted to keep their locs, but the guard reportedly threw the opinion in the trash.
Landor filed a lawsuit in federal court against government officials in their official and individual capacities. Landor brought his claims under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 (RLUIPA), which protects the religious liberties of individuals as well as houses of worship and other religious institutions. The U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Louisiana dismissed his claims against the prison officials in their individual capacities on the grounds that RLUIPA does not permit private individuals to bring claims seeking monetary damages against officials in their individual capacities. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed. The U.S. Supreme Court granted Landor’s petition for a writ of certiorari.
No one should have to experience what Landor endured at the hands of prison guards who did not respect his religious liberty. LDF remains committed to stamping out hair discrimination in all its forms. This is especially important for people in prisons, where Black incarcerated individuals bear the brunt of discriminatory prison grooming and hair policies.
This case concerns the scope of the mail exception to the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), which states that no FTCA claims can “aris[e] out of the loss, miscarriage, or negligent transmission” of mail.
Lebene Konan is a Black property owner who rents out units in Euless, Texas, a suburb of Fort Worth. In 2020, two U.S. Postal Service (USPS) employees began a years-long campaign of racial harassment against Konan. No similar harassment was inflicted on any of Konan’s white neighbors. One USPS employee intentionally changed the lock on the mailbox at one of Konan’s properties and gave the key to a white tenant. They taped a sign with bright red letters to Konan’s mailbox, announcing that they would not deliver mail to tenants. They also imposed an identification policy that applied only to Konan—and not to any of her white neighbors—when she came to pick up mail from the post office. The USPS employees stopped delivering mail to her and her tenants altogether, instead marking it as undeliverable and returning it to the post office. Konan complained to the USPS Inspector General, who confirmed that Konan was the owner and ordered the mail to be delivered.
Konan and her tenants did not receive important pieces of mail, including prescriptions, tax documents, loan payment notifications, credit card statements, medical bills, and car titles. Because the USPS did not deliver any mail to the units, many of Konan’s tenants were forced to move. Konan signed up for the USPS Informed Delivery service to receive notification of her mail that was being held at the local post office. When she attempted to retrieve her mail in person, the USPS employees resisted. This harassment continued for two years, while white-owned properties in the community continued to receive their mail as usual. Konan submitted more than fifty complaints to the USPS, including a formal administrative complaint, to no avail.
Ultimately, Konan filed a complaint in 2022 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas under the FTCA against the United States and the USPS. In her complaint, she alleged state law tort claims for nuisance, conversion, tortious interference with prospective business relationships, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. She also sued the USPS employees in their individual capacities, seeking monetary and injunctive relief under 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981 and 1985.
The FTCA waives the United States’ sovereign immunity “under circumstances where the United States, if a private person, would be liable.” However, the FTCA contains several exceptions to its waiver of sovereign immunity, including a “postal-matter” exception in 28 U.S.C. § 2680(b) that preserves immunity for “[a]ny claim arising out of the loss, miscarriage, or negligent transmission of letters or postal matter.”
The District Court concluded that the postal-matter exception codified in 28 U.S.C. § 2680(b) preserved the United States’ sovereign immunity with respect to each of Konan’s state law tort claims because her claims arose out of the “loss” and “miscarriage” of postal matter. The District Court dismissed Konan’s claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1981 for failure to state a claim, on the grounds that 42 U.S.C. § 1981 only authorizes claims against individuals acting under color of state law, and the USPS employees were acting under color of federal law. The District Court also dismissed the 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3) claims for failure to state a claim.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit unanimously reversed the dismissal of Konan’s FTCA claims on the grounds that the plain language of the FTCA and Supreme Court precedent in Dolan v. USPS, 546 U.S. 481 (2006), both make clear that an intentional refusal to deliver mail is not a “loss,” “miscarriage,” or “negligent transmission” within the meaning of the postal-matter exception. The Fifth Circuit affirmed the District Court’s dismissal of Konan’s civil rights claims.
While the civil rights claims have been dismissed, this case is important to ensure that government officials are held liable for intentional, racially discriminatory misconduct.
In March 2020, Idaho passed House Bill 500, known as the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act, Idaho Code §§ 33-6201–06 (2020), which imposed a categorical ban on the participation of transgender women and girls in women’s student athletics in public schools. The law bars all transgender girls and women from participating in, or even trying out for, public school girls’ or women’s sports teams from primary school to college, and at every level of competition from intramural to elite teams. The law also establishes a sex dispute verification process that permits any individual to “dispute” the sex of any student participating in girls’ or women’s athletics in the state. The verification process requires the challenged individual to undergo intrusive medical procedures, including gynecological exams. Student athletes who participate in boys’ or men’s sports are not subject to a comparable dispute verification process.
In April 2020, Lindsay Hecox, a trans woman, and Jane Doe, a cisgender woman, filed suit against Idaho. Hecox wanted to try out for the Boise State University women’s track and cross-country teams. Doe already played high school varsity sports but feared that her sex would be “disputed” under the law because of her masculine presentation.
In August 2020, the U.S. District Court for the District of Idaho preliminarily enjoined the Fairness in Women’s Sports Act. Applying heightened scrutiny, the District Court found that the Act likely violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because it subjects only students who want to play in female sports to the sex verification process and categorically bans trans girls and women from playing on any girls’ teams. The District Court concluded that Idaho failed to provide any evidence showing that the Act is substantially related to its supposed interest in advancing sex equality or expanding opportunity for women athletes. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed the District Court’s ruling. Idaho and individuals seeking to uphold the ban petitioned for a writ of certiorari, and the U.S. Supreme Court granted their petition.
As states across the country pass anti-trans sports bans, LDF remains committed to safeguarding the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection and ensuring that it is extended to all, including transgender and nonbinary people.
Whether Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 prohibits a state from consistently designating girls’ and boys’ sports teams based on biological sex determined at birth.
In 2021, West Virginia passed a law banning girls who are transgender from participating on all-girls sports teams from middle school to college. B.P.J., a fourteen-year-old transgender girl who had begun receiving puberty blockers and hormone therapy, attempted to try out for the girls’ sports teams at her middle school. After the middle school informed B.P.J. and her family that she would not be allowed to play sports on all-girls sports teams, her mother brought suit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia. The lawsuit argued that West Virginia’s law violates Title IX, which prohibits sex discrimination in schools receiving federal funding, and the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The District Court granted a preliminary injunction halting the enforcement of the statute pending the outcome of the litigation. The District Court found that B.P.J. was likely to succeed on the merits of her claims and ordered West Virginia to allow her to compete in girls’ sports. However, the District Court ultimately ruled for West Virginia at the next stage of summary judgment, rejecting both of B.P.J.’s claims. On the Equal Protection claim, the District Court held that West Virginia’s “definition of ‘girl’ as being based on ‘biological sex’” was “substantially related to the important government interest of providing equal athletic opportunities for females.” On B.P.J.’s Title IX claim, the District Court relied on regulations that authorize sex-separate sports in the same manner as the West Virginia law, so long as the overall opportunities for each sex are equal. The District Court thus rejected the claim because B.P.J. was still permitted to “try out for boys’ teams.”
On appeal, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that West Virginia’s law excluding B.P.J. from participating on girls’ teams violated Title IX and that the District Court should not have dismissed her Equal Protection claim. The U.S. Supreme Court denied West Virginia’s emergency application to enforce the law while the case proceeds through the lower courts.
In the wake of numerous anti-trans laws passed in states across the country, it is critical that the Supreme Court recognize that these laws are motivated by a desire to target trans women and girls for disfavored treatment, in violation of the Equal Protection Clause and Title IX.
