On 61st anniversary of Bloody Sunday, worries about the future of voting
rights and calls to action
[March 09, 2026]
By KIM CHANDLER
SELMA, Ala. (AP) — Sixty-one years after state troopers attacked Civil
Rights marchers on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, thousands gathered
in the Alabama city this weekend amid new concerns about the future of
the Voting Rights Act.
The March 7, 1965, violence that became known as Bloody Sunday shocked
the nation and helped spur passage of the landmark legislation that
dismantled barriers to voting for Black Americans in the Jim Crow South.
The anniversary was celebrated in this city that served as crucible for
the voting rights movement, with events through the weekend ending with
a commemorative march across the bridge Sunday. But the commemoration
came as the U.S. Supreme Court considers a case that could limit a
provision of the Voting Rights Act that has helped ensure some
congressional and local districts are drawn so minority voters have a
chance to elect their candidate of choice.
“I’m concerned that all of the advances that we made for the last 61
years are going to be eradicated,” said Charles Mauldin, 78, one of the
marchers beaten on Bloody Sunday.
Former and current Democratic officeholders, civil rights leaders and
tourists descended on Selma to pay homage to the pivotal moment of the
Civil Rights Movement and to issue calls to action. Speakers warned of
the looming court decision and criticized the Trump administration's
actions on immigration and efforts to roll back diversity, equity, and
inclusion.
Standing at the pulpit of the historic Tabernacle Baptist Church,
Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, said that like the marchers on Bloody Sunday,
they must press forward.
“Years after Bloody Sunday, the progress that stemmed from that
sacrifice is now being rolled back right in our faces,” the governor
said. Moore is the nation’s only Black governor currently in office.
“We are choosing this fight because those who marched across the Edmund
Pettus Bridge deserve better than us cowering while the freedoms that we
inherited and they fought for, are being ripped away,” Moore said.
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, speaking at a rally at the foot of the
bridge, said racism is on the rise in America and “Trump's Supreme Court
is gutting the Voting Rights Act.”
“Let's march forward today with the knowledge that we are the inheritors
of the faith that brought marchers to the bridge 61 years ago. It is now
on us to bend the arc of the moral universe toward justice,” Pritzker
said.
The annual commemoration in Selma is a mix of a civil rights
remembrances, church services and a street festival filled with vendors
and food trucks. It is also part political rally with an eye on
November's midterm elections and a longer view to the 2028 presidential
race.
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People march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge on the 61st Bloody Sunday
Anniversary, Sunday, March 8, 2026, in Selma, Ala. (AP Photo/Mike
Stewart)
The commemoration included a tribute to the late Rev. Jesse Jackson,
the civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate who
regularly attended the annual Selma march. He died on Feb. 17 at age
84.
Yusef Jackson said his father's legacy will be carried forward. “In
November, we will go back to the polls and take our government back,
setting our country on the right path,” Jackson said.
The looming court decision cast a shadow over the festivities.
Justices are expected to rule soon on a Louisiana case about the
role of race in drawing congressional districts. A ruling
prohibiting or limiting that role could have sweeping consequences,
potentially opening the door for Republican-controlled states to
redistrict and roll back majority Black and Latino districts that
tend to favor Democrats.
U.S. Rep. Shomari Figures won election in 2024 to an Alabama
district that was redrawn by a federal court to give Black voters a
greater voice. His district will likely be targeted if the state
gets the opportunity to redraw lines. He said what happened in Selma
and the subsequent passage of the Voting Rights Act “was monumental
in shaping what America looks like and how America is represented in
Congress.”
In 1965, the Bloody Sunday marchers led by John Lewis and Hosea
Williams walked in pairs across the Selma bridge headed toward the
state capital of Montgomery. Mauldin, then 17, was part of the third
pair behind Williams and Lewis.
At the apex of the bridge, they could see the sea of law enforcement
officers, including some on horseback, waiting for them. But they
kept going.
“It wasn’t that we didn’t have fear, it’s that we chose courage over
fear,” Mauldin recalled.
A crowd of several thousand filed behind elected officials on this
Sunday for the march across the bridge, this time protected by state
law enforcement officers.
James and Dianne Reynolds drove from Montgomery for the annual
commemoration. James Reynolds, 79, was a high school student in
Selma and worked with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
helping to set up demonstrations in Selma. He said he sees echoes of
the past in efforts to restrict voting, such as curtailing mail-in
voting and absentee voting.
“When you look at what’s going on today, we’re still fighting for
the right to vote," Reynolds said.
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