NAACP Legal Defense Fund sues Fayette County over ‘discriminatory’ 2021 electoral map

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund filed a federal lawsuit on Feb. 27, 2025 challenging Fayette County’s 2021 electoral map as racially discriminatory.

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund filed a federal lawsuit Thursday challenging Fayette County’s 2021 electoral map as racially discriminatory.

The lawsuit, filed in the Western District of Tennessee, claims that the map adopted by Fayette County commissioners was chosen “at least in part with the intent to racially discriminate against Black voters,” violating the Voting Rights Act as well as Black Fayette County voters’ constitutional rights.

“The facts are clear: The map unfairly targeted Fayette County’s Black population,” attorney John Cusick said in a news conference Thursday. “Although the Black voters make up more than a quarter of Fayette County’s population, they have zero representation on the 19-member, all-white county commission.”

The Fayette County Commission adopted a redistricting plan with no majority-minority districts against the advice of its own redistricting committee and outside legal counsel. The state comptroller’s local redistricting guide requires county legislative bodies to consider minority representation while developing new districts.

The commission rejected plans that included districts with majority Black voting age populations, in effect diluting the power of Black voters to elect candidates of their choice, the lawsuit states.

“This map is a shame. It purposefully destroys the electoral opportunities for Black Fayette County voters,” NAACP Fayette-Somerville Branch President Elton Holmes said. “We see the harm of not having effective representatives for Black people in the county. We need advocates who will respond to the needs of our community, involving issues with schooling, infrastructure, health care, etcetera.”

The filing comes after the U.S. Justice Department sued the Fayette County Board of Commissioners in January, similarly alleging that the board violated the Voting Rights Act when it adopted the 2021 redistricting plan.

“This lawsuit sends a clear message that Fayette County must remedy these violations and pass a fair and non-racially discriminatory map,” Cusick said. “It also honors the legacy of many Black voters and community members here in Fayette County.”

Between 1950 and the early 1970s, Black residents were forced to move into Tent Cities when they were evicted from sharecropper housing after registering to vote. Black residents who participated in voter registration drives were also blocked from purchasing groceries and obtaining medical care, according to the University of Memphis.

The federal government filed two lawsuits in the 1950s and 1960s to protect Black voters’ rights.

“Sixty years later, Black voters again here have no representation on this county map, and the courageous plaintiffs and the community members who are here with us today … honor that legacy (and) continue that fight,” Cusick said.

The lawsuit filed Thursday by LDF and Donati Law represents the claims of the NAACP’s Fayette-Somerville Branch and five Black Fayette County voters: Christine Woods, Thomas Gilmore, Velisa Fitzpatrick, Willie Luellen, and Marandy Wilkerson. Fayette County, the board of county commissioners, the Fayette County Election Commission Board and Fayette County Administrator of Elections Joshua Tapp are named as defendants.

“The Fayette County Commission is not meeting the needs of Black residents in Fayette County,” Woods stated in a news release. “Without representation on the County Commission, our priorities have long been ignored, including concerns regarding our public schools, economic development, and access to resources like the Bernard Community Center.

The suit seeks to permanently prevent the 2021 map from being used to conduct elections, and the timely creation of “remedial maps” that include four “reasonably configured single-member districts in which Black voters comprise the majority.”
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