Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/22pdf/21-1086_1co6.pdf
Page Number: 33

26 

ALLEN v. MILLIGAN 

Opinion of the Court 

It notes that one of plaintiffs’ experts, Dr. Duchin, used an 
algorithm to create “2 million districting plans for Alabama 
. . . without taking race into account in any way in the gen-
eration process.”  2 App. 710.  Of these two million “race-
blind”  plans,  none  contained  two  majority-black  districts 
while many plans did not contain any.  Ibid.  Alabama also 
points  to  a  “race-neutral”  computer  simulation  conducted 
by  another  one  of  plaintiffs’  experts,  Dr.  Kosuke  Imai, 
which produced 30,000 potential maps.  Brief for Alabama 
55.  As with Dr. Duchin’s maps, none of the maps that Dr. 
Imai created contained two majority-black districts.  See 2 
App. 571–572.  Alabama thus contends that because HB1 
sufficiently “resembles” the “race-neutral” maps created by 
Dr. Duchin and Dr. Imai—all of the maps lack two majority-
black districts—HB1 does not violate §2.  Brief for Alabama 
54. 
  Alabama’s  reliance  on  the  maps  created  by  Dr.  Duchin 
and Dr. Imai is misplaced.  For one, neither Duchin’s nor 
Imai’s maps accurately represented the districting process 
in Alabama.  Dr. Duchin’s maps were based on old census 
data—from 2010 instead of 2020—and ignored certain tra-
ditional districting criteria, such as keeping together com-
munities  of  interest,  political  subdivisions,  or  municipali-
ties.6    And  Dr.  Imai’s  30,000  maps  failed  to  incorporate 
Alabama’s own districting guidelines, including keeping to-
gether  communities  of  interest  and  preserving  municipal 
boundaries.  See Supp. App. 58–59.7 
—————— 

6 Dr.  Duchin  created  her  two  million  map  sample  as  part  of  an  aca-
demic article that she helped author, not for her work on this case, and 
the article was neither entered into evidence below nor made part of the 
record here.  See 2 App. 710; see also M. Duchin & D. Spencer, Models, 
Race, and the Law, 130 Yale L. J. Forum 744, 763–764 (2021) (Duchin & 
Spencer). 

7 The principal dissent decrees that Dr. Duchin’s and Dr. Imai’s maps 
are “surely probative,” forgiving the former’s use of stale census data as 
well  as  both  mapmakers’  collective  failure  to  incorporate  many  tradi-
tional  districting  guidelines.    Post,  at  23–24,  and  n. 14  (opinion  of