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Rh black voting-age population above 40%. Id., at 54, 67, 71–72. In a similar vein, Dr. Duchin testified about an academic study in which she had randomly “generated 2 million districting plans for Alabama” using a race-neutral algorithm that gave priority to compactness and contiguity. 2 App. 710; see Duchin & Spencer 765. She “found some [plans] with one majority-black district, but never found a second … majority-black district in 2 million attempts.” 2 App. 710. “[T]hat it is hard to draw two majority-black districts by accident,” Dr. Duchin explained, “show[ed] the importance of doing so on purpose.” Id., at 714.

The plurality of Justices who join Part III–B–I of ’s opinion appear to agree that the plaintiffs could not prove the first precondition of their statewide vote-dilution claim—that black Alabamians could constitute a majority in two “reasonably configured” districts, Wisconsin Legislature, 595 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 3)—by drawing an illustrative map in which race was predominant. See. That should be the end of these cases, as the illustrative maps here are palpable racial gerrymanders. The plaintiffs’ experts clearly applied “express racial target[s]” by setting out to create 50%-plus majority-black districts in both Districts 2 and 7. Bethune-Hill v. ''Virginia State Bd. of Elections'', 580 U. S. 178, 192 (2017). And it is impossible to conceive of the State adopting the illustrative maps without pursuing the same racially motivated goals. Again, the maps’ key design features are: (1) making District 2 majority-black by connecting black