Opinion of the Court
latter layered atop the former; District 6 is right in the State’s middle; and District 7 spans the central west. Id., at 951.
In 2020, the decennial census revealed that Alabama’s population had grown by 5.1%. See 1 App. 86. A group of plaintiffs led by Alabama legislator Bobby Singleton sued the State, arguing that the existing congressional map was malapportioned and racially gerrymandered in violation of the Equal Protection Clause. 582 F. Supp. 3d, at 938–939. While litigation was proceeding, the Alabama Legislature’s Committee on Reapportionment began creating a new districting map. Ibid. Although the prior decade’s population growth did not change the number of seats that Alabama would receive in the House, the growth had been unevenly distributed across the State, and the existing map was thus out of date.
To solve the problem, the State turned to experienced mapmaker Randy Hinaman, who had created several districting maps that Alabama used over the past 30 years. Id., at 947–948. The starting point for Hinaman was the then-existing 2011 congressional map, itself a product of the 2001 map that Hinaman had also created. Civ. No. 21–1530 (ND Ala.), ECF Doc. 70–2, pp. 40, 93–94; see also 582 F. Supp. 3d, at 950. Hinaman worked to adjust the 2011 map in accordance with the redistricting guidelines set by the legislature’s Reapportionment Committee. Id., at 948–950; 1 App. 275. Those guidelines prioritized population equality, contiguity, compactness, and avoiding dilution of minority voting strength. 582 F. Supp. 3d, at 1035–1036. They also encouraged, as a secondary matter, avoiding incumbent pairings, respecting communities of interest, minimizing the number of counties in each district, and preserving cores of existing districts. Id., at 1036–1037.
The resulting map Hinaman drew largely resembled the 2011 map, again producing only one district in which black voters constituted a majority of the voting age population.
