Wednesday, May 13 — The Republican field is fighting itself

THE MAP IS GONE. THE REPUBLICAN FIGHT IS ON.

Forty-eight hours after the Supreme Court vacated the injunction that made District 2 a 48.7 percent BVAP D+5 district, the Republican primary for the new 39.9 percent BVAP R+17 district is already a contested field. State Rep. Rhett Marques (Enterprise) announced his switch from District 1 on Monday afternoon within hours of the ruling. Joshua McKee, a four-time-relocated former Green Beret running in District 1 since July of last year, announced his own switch last night and opened his campaign by calling Marques a politician who "turned his back on the people of Alabama."

McKee's launch statement names Marques five times and Donald Trump six times. It does not mention Shomari Figures even once. That is the campaign McKee has chosen. The Republican primary is not about the seat. It is about which Republican gets to challenge a Court-Appointed Incumbent who, on the partisan environment of the new map, would have lost the seat by double digits in 2024.

Major-party qualifying for the August 11 special primary opens one week from today, on Wednesday May 20, and closes Friday May 22 at five o'clock. That three-day window will determine the final field. As of this morning, three Republicans have committed publicly: Hampton Harris, Rhett Marques, and Joshua McKee. Other Republicans may file during the window. The Democratic field for the special primary remains, as of this brief, Shomari Figures alone.

THREE QUESTIONS FOR THE COURT-APPOINTED INCUMBENT

One: Now That The Courtroom That Made Him Is Gone, Will The Money Dry Up?

The DCCC, EMILY's List, the Section 2 litigation PACs, and the national redistricting machinery invested in a court order, not in a candidate. With the court order vacated and the underlying district environment shifted twenty-two points to the right, the case for continued national investment has to be made fresh. His Q2 FEC report is due July 15. That filing covers his first full quarter of fundraising on the new map. The receipts side of that filing — not the press release that accompanies it — will tell us who is still on Shomari Figures and who is on a plane to the next Section 2 case in another state.

Two: Will His Spouse And Family Leave Their Maryland Home And Join Him On The Trail?

The Figures family's residence in the Washington area is a matter of public record. It was the geography when he ran in 2024 and it has been the geography for his term. With one hundred seventy-four days until the general election, the question of whether the incumbent will live in Alabama for the next ninety days matters more this week than it did last week. Most Alabama members of Congress fly home on the weekends. The Congressman who represents District 2 has a four-hour drive between his front door and the Capitol, and a five-hour flight between his family's front door and the Wiregrass.

Three: Will He Hold Wiregrass Events? Does He Even Know Where The Wiregrass Is?

Shomari Figures has spent his term representing Mobile, Montgomery, and the Black Belt under the court-drawn map. The Wiregrass — Coffee, Dale, Geneva, Houston, Covington, Pike, and Crenshaw counties, roughly two hundred thousand voters now added to the district — was never his territory. He has no campaign history there, no events on the public record there, no relationships there. The incumbent has one hundred seventy-four days to introduce himself to a region that is now nearly half his constituency.

TUSKEGEE — FOUR DAYS, FIFTY-SIX DAYS OF SILENCE

Four days from today — Sunday, May 17 — the Fresenius Kidney Care dialysis center on East Martin Luther King Highway in Tuskegee closes. Roughly fifty patients lose the place they go three times a week to stay alive. The closest remaining facilities are in Tallassee, Auburn, and Union Springs, thirty to fifty miles away each. Tuskegee Mayor Chris Lee said in February that for these patients, the loss of the local center is the difference between life and death.

The closure date is the deadline Rep. Figures himself negotiated. He announced it in a press release issued from his Washington office on March 18. That release was fifty-six days ago. The release said his office would "continue to explore long-term solutions for dialysis treatment." There has been no public follow-up since. No new statement, no Tuskegee site visit on the public record, no companion bill, no committee hearing. Macon County stays in District 2 under both maps. Whichever way the litigation runs, the dialysis patients are still District 2 voters. They will remember who showed up.

Between Monday afternoon and last night, the Congressman issued one statement, gave at least one on-camera interview, and posted multiple times on social media. Each of those was on the Supreme Court ruling and what it meant for his seat. Zero of them were on Tuskegee. The thing that travels four hundred miles in a wheelchair to a dialysis chair did not generate a press release. The thing that threatens his job did.

THE ROAD TO NOVEMBER 3

November 3 is the day District 2 voters take this seat back. One hundred seventy-four days from today. Four dates between here and there.

Tuesday, May 19, 2026 — Six days from today. The statewide primary proceeds as scheduled per Secretary of State Wes Allen. Voters in District 2 will vote, but those results will be voided under HB1 once the trial court formally lifts the injunction following Monday's Supreme Court remand.

Wednesday, May 20 to Friday, May 22, 2026 — Major-party qualifying for the August 11 special primary opens one week from today and closes the Friday after. The field that survives that seventy-two-hour window will be the Republican field that runs against Shomari Figures.

Tuesday, August 11, 2026 — Ninety days from today. Special Republican primary. No runoff. That date sets the opponent. It does not set the seat.

Tuesday, November 3, 2026 — The general election. The 2023 map drops the District's BVAP from approximately 48.7 percent to approximately 39.9 percent and shifts the partisan environment to approximately R+17. This is the date District 2 voters take this seat back.

THE CONGRESSMAN'S FIRST WIREGRASS TOWN HALL — SUGGESTED TOPICS

If Shomari Figures intends to introduce himself to the Wiregrass between now and November, we have some suggestions for the agenda. We are updating the topic list as the district develops.

** Topic 1 — The Maryland-to-Mobile Commute: A Working Family's Guide. **

The Congressman will share practical tips on representing a district nine hundred miles from where his family lives. Topics will include how to schedule constituent meetings around BWI flight delays, why FaceTime is basically the same thing as a town hall, and the surprising similarities between the cost of living in Bethesda and Brundidge. Bring your own questions about your long-distance relationship with your Congressman. Coffee will be served. By staff.

** Topic 2 — Peanuts: A Field Trip. **

Following last week's introductory lecture, the Congressman will lead a field trip to an actual peanut farm. Attendees will be issued boots, a hat, and a one-page briefing document prepared by his Washington office on what a peanut is and where peanuts come from. The Congressman will pose for photographs at three predetermined points along the row. Q&A will be moderated by his press secretary, who flew in this morning from Reagan National and will leave on the four-fifty-five back to BWI.

** Topic 3 — Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act and You: A Litigation Update. **

In lieu of policy proposals on the issues facing Wiregrass families — peanut prices, Fort Novosel funding, the Tuskegee dialysis closure, off-road diesel costs, school choice — the Congressman will provide a detailed update on the federal court litigation he hopes will return him to the district he was originally given. Attendees will receive a complimentary copy of his statement on the Supreme Court ruling, three press releases about three Republican-appointed judges, and a fundraising QR code. The event will conclude with a moment of silence for the map.

THE FIGHT WILL GO ON — IN COURT, ANYWAY

On Tuesday morning at twelve thirty-nine, the Congressman released a statement. "The fight must and will go on." His operating plan: lose at the Supreme Court, then ask three lower-court judges to overrule the Supreme Court on a different constitutional theory. He has pinned his political future to the hope that the three Republican-appointed judges on the district court will find intentional discrimination under the Fourteenth Amendment that survives Callais.

That is a litigation strategy. It is not a campaign. The campaign is in the Wiregrass, in Macon County, in Montgomery, and in the Black Belt — in living rooms and church basements and union halls between now and November. The Republicans are spending the next ninety days fighting each other for the right to compete in those rooms. The incumbent is spending the next ninety days fighting in a federal courthouse. One of those is how you win an election. The other is how you delay losing one.

November 3 is when District 2 voters get the final word. One hundred seventy-four days from today.