Thomas, J., dissenting
residents in one metropolitan area (Montgomery) with parts of the rural Black Belt and black residents in another metropolitan area (Mobile); (2) leaving enough of the Black Belt’s majority-black rural areas for District 7 to maintain its majority-black status; and (3) reducing District 1 to the white remainder of the southern third of the State.
If the State did this, we would call it a racial gerrymander, and rightly so. We would have no difficulty recognizing race as “the predominant factor motivating [the placement of] significant number[s] of voters within or without” Districts 1, 2, and 7. Miller, 515 U. S., at 916. The “stark splits in the racial composition of populations moved into and out of” Districts 1 and 2 would make that obvious. Bethune-Hill, 580 U. S., at 192. So would the manifest absence of any nonracial justification for the new District 1. And so would the State’s clear intent to ensure that both Districts 2 and 7 hit their preordained racial targets. See ibid. (noting that “pursu[it of] a common redistricting policy toward multiple districts” may show predominance). That the plan delivered proportional control for a particular minority—a statistical anomaly that over 2 million race-blind simulations did not yield and 20,000 race-conscious simulations did not even approximate—would be still further confirmation.
The State could not justify such a plan simply by arguing that it was less bizarre to the naked eye than other, more elaborate racial gerrymanders we have encountered. See ante, at 19–20 (discussing cases). As we held in Miller, visual “bizarreness” is not “a necessary element of the constitutional wrong,” only “persuasive circumstantial evidence.” 515 U. S., at 912–913.[1]
- ↑ Of course, bizarreness is in the eye of the beholder, and, while labels like “ ‘tentacles’ ” or “ ‘appendages’ ” have no ultimate legal significance, it is far from clear that they do not apply here. See ante, at 12. The tendrils with which the various versions of illustrative District 2 would
