{"id":210927,"date":"2026-05-17T13:17:50","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T13:17:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/they-may-draw-racist-maps-but-we-are-the-south-thousands-rally-in-alabama-for-black-voting-rights-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2026-05-17T13:17:50","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T13:17:50","slug":"they-may-draw-racist-maps-but-we-are-the-south-thousands-rally-in-alabama-for-black-voting-rights-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/they-may-draw-racist-maps-but-we-are-the-south-thousands-rally-in-alabama-for-black-voting-rights-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018They may draw racist maps, but we are the south\u2019: thousands rally in Alabama for Black voting rights – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

People came to Montgomery by bus, car and plane to march on the state capitol with local and national leaders
Thousands of people from across the country descended on Montgomery, the capital of Alabama<\/a>, on Saturday. They arrived by bus, by car and by plane to gather for the All Roads Lead to the South rally, following the supreme court\u2019s Louisiana v Callais decision last month, which essentially gutted the Voting Rights Act and severely limited protections against voting discrimination.
Organized by a coalition of national and local civic engagement groups, the rally took place outside the Alabama state capitol building, in the same plaza where the 1965 Selma to Montgomery voting rights marches \u2013 three nonviolent demonstrations in support of Black voting rights \u2013 are enshrined.
\u201cWe\u2019re here, Montgomery, not at a stopping point, but at a starting point,\u201d Steven L Reed, mayor of Montgomery and the first Black person to hold the position, told the crowd. \u201cWe\u2019re here in this city because of the spirit, because of the courage and because of the commitment of our forefathers and foremothers who got us to this point.\u201d
Following the supreme court decision, Republican-led states rushed to redraw their voting maps in ways that weaken Black political power. Tennessee and Florida have already passed new maps, while Alabama, Louisiana and Georgia seem poised to follow. Mississippi temporarily paused redistricting efforts, with the state\u2019s governor promising to revisit the issue soon.
Voting activists from these states affected by Republican redistricting attempts \u2013 along with local and national elected officials, including the senators Cory Booker and Raphael Warnock and the representatives Terri Sewell, Shomari Figures and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez \u2013 took the stage to mobilize and energise attendees.
\u201cWe need to fight with all we got,\u201d said Charlane Oliver, a Tennessee state senator who protested the state\u2019s redistricting by standing on her desk last week. \u201cThey may draw some racist maps, but we are the south, this is our south. The south belongs to us. The south got something to say, and we gon\u2019 speak real loud and clear in November.\u201d
Throughout the event, spontaneous chants of \u201cvote, vote, vote\u201d emerged from the audience. At times, All Roads to the South felt like a worship event, harkening back to the Black church\u2019s vital role in the civil rights movement. It began with a prayer; when an attendee had a medical event, an emcee asked those gathered to \u201cput their praying hands together\u201d. Multiple gospel songs were performed throughout the day.
For many attendees, being at the rally was personal. Their family members fought for voting rights. Now, they said, it\u2019s up to them to take up the banner.
\u201cMy grandmama, my momma, my mother-in-law \u2013 our ancestors did not cross that bridge, walk during the bus boycott, my cousins got locked in the First Baptist Church [in Montgomery], across from the police station in the 60s, my other cousin got beat up by a horse up on Jackson Street \u2013 we didn\u2019t do all that for this,\u201d said Carole Burton, a Montgomery resident.
The day began in Selma, with a prayer service at the historic Tabernacle Baptist church, followed by a silent walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, the site of the brutal \u201cBloody Sunday\u201d violence against civil rights marchers in 1965. From there, those who attended the actions in Selma traveled by bus to Montgomery, where they were joined by thousands.
All Roads Lead to the South was not an isolated event \u2013 more than 50 satellite events were scheduled across the country for people who couldn\u2019t make it to Alabama. Speakers also noted that the fight would continue elsewhere.
\u201cOur task is bigger than defending the past,\u201d Rukia Lumumba, director of the Mississippi VRA Rapid Response Coalition and M4BL Action Fund, said. \u201cOur task is to build a democracy worthy of the people who bled to create it in the first place.\u201d<\/p>\n

source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

People came to Montgomery by bus, car and plane to march on the state capitol with local and national leaders Thousands of people from across the country descended on Montgomery, the capital of Alabama, on Saturday. They arrived by bus, by car and by plane to gather for the All Roads Lead to the South […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":210928,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-210927","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210927","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210927"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210927\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/210928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210927"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210927"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210927"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}