Alabama governor calls special session to delay primaries, revisit congressional map

Kay Ivey has called Alabama lawmakers into special session to push back the state’s May 19 primaries and give Republicans time to redraw a congressional map that federal courts had blocked. The move turns election timing into a political weapon, with the filing calendar, ballot preparation and voter outreach all hanging on whether legislators can finish new lines before the midterm season hardens.

The scramble followed the U.S. Supreme Court’s April 29 decision in Louisiana v. Callais, which weakened a key Voting Rights Act redistricting precedent and immediately revived GOP efforts across the South to revisit congressional maps. In Alabama, Attorney General Steve Marshall filed emergency motions the same day asking the high court to lift an injunction that has barred the Legislature from redrawing the state’s congressional districts before 2030. Ivey set the special session to begin Monday, May 4, at 4 p.m. in Montgomery.

The stakes are unusually high because Alabama is not starting from a neutral map. The state’s current court-ordered congressional lines produce five Republicans and two Democrats, and the version used in the 2024 elections elected two Black representatives to Congress for the first time in Alabama history. That map replaced an earlier plan that courts rejected, and the current fight is over whether lawmakers will be allowed to return to a version of the district lines that had already failed legal review.

The clock is tight. Alabama’s 2026 primary is still scheduled for May 19, with a runoff on June 16 and the general election on November 3. Moving the primary would give lawmakers room to enact a new map and state election officials time to reset the machinery that follows, from candidate filings to printing ballots and updating voter guidance. Without a delay, any redraw would risk colliding with an election already in motion.

Georgia chose a different path. Gov. Brian Kemp said Friday that Georgia will not redraw its congressional map or cancel the May 19 primary before the midterms, arguing that voting is already underway. Georgia Republicans had pressed for a special session after the same Supreme Court ruling, but Kemp said any changes would be left for the 2028 cycle instead.

The split shows how quickly states are adapting to the new legal terrain. Alabama is moving to reopen the map and the calendar at the same time; Georgia is freezing both. For minority voters and candidates in districts now under review, the difference is more than procedural. It will shape who has time to qualify, which districts remain intact, and whether lawmakers or courts end up deciding the boundaries that define the next Congress.