Eleven days
This is the number that matters this week. Saturday, May 17. Approximately fifty people who depend on three-times-a-week dialysis treatment will, on May 18, need to get to Tallassee, Auburn, or Union Springs to keep that treatment going. For an elderly or infirm patient with limited transportation, three round trips a week to another county is not a small adjustment. It is a hardship that some people will not survive.
The pattern is now visible across this district. The only kidney dialysis center in Wilcox County closed March 20 — same provider, same poverty profile, same Black Belt county. Two closures in two months in two of the poorest counties in the United States, both inside Alabama-2. This is no longer an isolated event. It is how the rural healthcare system is contracting in real time, in our district, while the people responsible for federal advocacy work the legislative calendar instead of the closure calendar.
Where we are with the special session
The Alabama Legislature is in Day 3 of its special session at the State Capitol. The session opened Monday afternoon. Two bills are on the table — HB 1 (Speaker Pro Tempore Pringle, Mobile) and SB 1 (Sen. Elliott, Josephine) — that prepare the state to hold special primary elections in congressional and state Senate districts whose boundaries are altered by court action. The bills do not, by themselves, change any district line. The lines change only if and when federal courts lift the standing injunctions on the 2023 congressional map and the 2021 state Senate map. As of this morning, those injunctions remain in place.
Secretary of State Wes Allen has confirmed that Alabama's May 19 primary proceeds under the current court-drawn map. The candidates already advancing — Hampton Harris and Shomari Figures in Alabama-2, the full Republican and Democratic primary fields in every other race — remain on the ballot under the lines we have today. Anyone in this district who has been told otherwise by friends or family has been told something inaccurate.
What may change later: if the federal courts lift the congressional injunction in the coming weeks or months, the bills now under consideration would trigger a special primary in the affected districts. The current Black Voting Age Population in Alabama-2 is 48.7%. Under the 2023 map that Republican legislators hope to reinstate, that figure would drop to 39.9%. The mathematical effect on representation is not abstract. It is the question of whether this district, as currently constituted, exists six months from now.
Gas prices and the kitchen table
A line that moved this week and that families in this district are feeling: the national average price of a gallon of gasoline is $4.48, up roughly $1.50 since before the Iran war began. Industry analysts are openly forecasting $5 a gallon if the Strait of Hormuz is not reopened by the end of May. Brent crude closed yesterday at $109.87 a barrel after a 6% spike Monday on attacks against the UAE.
What this means in Selma, in Greenville, in Tuskegee, in West Mobile: a working family driving 200 miles a week to and from a job is now paying $30 a week more to do that work than they were three months ago. A trucker hauling product in this district is paying $1.50 a gallon more on diesel — a cost that ends up on the grocery shelf and on the small-business invoice. The fuel price is not a political talking point. It is a household budget item that is squeezing the people who keep this district running.
The work this week
Three concrete things that matter most for the next seven days.
Tuskegee. Eleven days. The closure is on the calendar. Local pressure has moved the date twice. Local pressure is what works. Phone calls, public meeting attendance, and personal contact with anyone you know who is losing their dialysis access — those are the mechanisms that have produced results so far.
The May 19 primary. Yesterday was the registration deadline. There is no in-person early voting in Alabama. Election Day is the only day to vote. Make sure neighbors who plan to vote on May 19 know where their polling place is and have transportation if they need it. The November 3 general election deadline is still ahead — note it now for anyone who missed yesterday's.
The special session. Day 3 today. Expected to wrap by the end of the week. The bills do not change district lines yet, but the legislators who vote for them are creating the framework for whatever happens next. Pay attention to your representative's vote.
Key dates
This week — Special session at the State Capitol; expected wrap by end of week.
Saturday, May 17 — Fresenius Kidney Care Tuskegee dialysis center scheduled closure. T-11 from today.
Tuesday, May 19 — Alabama statewide primary election.
Tuesday, November 3 — General Election.
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