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Page Number: 64

20 

BRNOVICH v. DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE 

KAGAN, J., dissenting 

outcomes) resulting from a law not needed to achieve a gov-
ernment’s legitimate goals.  That showing is hardly insub-
stantial; and as a result, Section 2 vote denial suits do not 
often succeed (even with lower courts applying the law as 
written,  not  the  majority’s  new,  concocted  version).    See 
Brief for State and Local Election Officials as Amici Curiae 
15  (finding  only  nine  winning  cases  since  Shelby  County, 
each  involving  “an  intensely  local  appraisal”  of  a  “contro-
versial  polic[y]  in  specific  places”).    But  Section  2  was  in-
deed meant to do something important—crucial to the op-
eration  of  our  democracy.    The  provision  tells  courts—
however “radical” the majority might find the idea, ante, at 
25—to eliminate facially neutral (as well as targeted) elec-
toral rules that unnecessarily create inequalities of access 
to the political process.  That is the very project of the stat-
ute, as conceived and as written—and now as damaged by 
this Court. 

B 
  The majority’s opinion mostly inhabits a law-free zone.  It 
congratulates  itself  in  advance  for  giving  Section  2’s  text 
“careful consideration.”  Ante, at 14.  And then it leaves that 
language almost wholly behind.  See ante, at 14–21.  (Every 
once in a while, when its lawmaking threatens to leap off 
the  page,  it  thinks  to  sprinkle  in  a  few  random  statutory 
words.)    So  too  the  majority  barely  mentions  this  Court’s 
precedents  construing  Section  2’s  text.    On  both  those 
counts, you can see why.  As just described, Section 2’s lan-
guage is broad.  See supra, at 12–20.  To read it fairly, then, 
is to read it broadly.  And to read it broadly is to do much 
that the majority is determined to avoid.  So the majority 
ignores  the  sweep  of  Section  2’s  prohibitory  language.    It 
fails  to  note  Section  2’s  application  to  every  conceivable 
kind  of  voting  rule.    It  neglects  to  address  the  provision’s 
concern  with  how  those  rules  may  “abridge[ ],”  not  just