Redistricting Just Turned Shomari Figures’ Safe Seat Into a Toss-Up. Can He Still Win?

Congressman Shomari Figures’ Alabama 2nd Congressional District — which includes Mobile — was redrawn following the U.S. Supreme Court’s Louisiana v. Callais decision, turning what had been a comfortable seat into what analysts now describe as a genuine toss-up.

The district’s Black voter population dropped from 47% to 40% under the new lines, and the redrawn map would have favored President Trump by 14 points in the 2024 election, pushing the seat’s partisan lean sharply toward Republicans. In his first term in 2024, Figures won with 54.6% of the vote against Republican Caroleene Dobson’s 45.4% — a comfortable margin that new district lines could erase.

An internal poll from late June shows Figures nearly tied with Republican primary candidate Rhett Marques, 44% to 45%. “I don’t know about you, but you give me your 40 percent Black district, I like my chances,” Figures said of his odds under the new map. The Cook Political Report has downgraded the race from “Safe Republican” to “Lean Republican,” while Split Ticket’s model rates the contest a toss-up — a notable shift in outside handicapping for a South Alabama congressional seat.

National political conditions add another variable to the race: polling shows President Trump’s disapproval rating hovering around 58%, a headwind that could work in Figures’ favor if it depresses Republican turnout or shifts persuadable voters, even in a district redrawn to be more favorable to the GOP.

How the district was drawn

The 2nd District lines under which Figures was elected in 2024 were drawn by a federal three-judge court after the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Allen v. Milligan upheld a ruling that Alabama’s congressional map, which had one majority-Black district out of seven, likely violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.