Alabama State Rep. Juandalynn Givan took to Facebook on Monday to hurl racially charged insults at U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, calling him an "Uncle Tom" and questioning his racial identity after the Court struck down a court-ordered congressional map that had favored Democrats in the state.
The video, first reported by Fox News Digital, showed Givan delivering an extended personal attack on the longest-serving current justice, not over the legal reasoning of the ruling, but over Thomas's race and what she characterized as a betrayal of Black Americans.
The remarks came in direct response to a Monday Supreme Court decision that effectively overruled 11th Circuit Court judges and their court-drawn congressional map in Alabama. That 2023 map had helped create an additional Democratic-leaning seat during the 2024 elections. The new ruling could clear the way for contested maps that would eliminate two Democratic-held congressional seats, potentially affecting Reps. Terri Sewell and Shomari Figures.
Givan did not mince words. She went after Thomas in deeply personal terms that would end the career of any Republican lawmaker who aimed equivalent language at a Black liberal jurist.
On Facebook, Givan said:
"He must've been the one that sold us out in Africa. He must have been. His ancestors had to be the ones that sold us out in Africa that caused us to be chained."
She continued:
"He is the man who has turned us back into the hands of the master."
Givan then questioned Thomas's very identity as a Black man, invoking slavery in graphic terms:
"I don't know what kind of Black he is. I don't know what d, plantation this man came from. I don't know what slave ship he was on. I don't know what part of the slave ship he was on."
And she labeled him a tool of the Republican Party in language that left nothing to interpretation:
"You have sided with the Republican Party. You are a freaking straw boss... or d, Uncle Tom for these people. I just don't get it."
That is a sitting state legislator, speaking on a public platform, directing racial slurs at a sitting Supreme Court justice, because she disagreed with his jurisprudence.
Thomas acts in a supervisory role over district cases covering Alabama. His Monday decision effectively overruled the 11th Circuit Court judges' court-drawn map, which had been in place since 2023. The justices struck down that map, which had helped Democrats pick up a seat in the 2024 cycle.
The practical effect is significant. The decision could eliminate two Democratic-held congressional seats in Alabama. Givan herself noted the ruling could render two seats "null and void," potentially forcing a new vote under newly permitted maps. An upcoming May 19 primary adds urgency to the timeline.
Thomas has consistently opposed what he calls "racial apportionment" of congressional seats, arguing that the practice is itself discriminatory and would violate the Constitution. That position has made him a frequent target of progressive anger, but Givan's remarks went far beyond policy disagreement. The Supreme Court's clearance for Alabama to redraw its congressional maps ahead of the 2026 midterms had already drawn sharp reactions, but nothing approaching Givan's language.
Imagine, for a moment, a white Republican state legislator posting a video in which he questioned the racial authenticity of a Black liberal justice, invoked slave ships, and called the justice a slur. The national media would treat it as a five-alarm emergency. Colleagues would demand a resignation within hours. The party apparatus would issue statements by nightfall.
Givan's remarks have drawn no such reckoning. Thomas, who has served on the Court since 1991, has long endured a particular strain of hostility reserved for Black conservatives, attacks that question not his reasoning but his right to hold the views he holds. The pattern is familiar. The silence from Democratic leadership is equally familiar.
Thomas himself has faced security threats serious enough to force him to deliver speeches remotely. The climate around him is not abstract. When an elected official publicly dehumanizes a justice, invoking slavery, questioning his ancestry, calling him a racial epithet, it does not occur in a vacuum.
Lost in Givan's tirade is the substance of what Thomas has actually argued. He has maintained that drawing congressional districts on the basis of race, even with the stated goal of helping minority voters, violates the equal protection principles of the Constitution. That is a legal argument. Reasonable people can disagree with it. Courts have disagreed with it at various points.
But disagreement with a legal position does not license the kind of language Givan used. Calling a Black justice an "Uncle Tom" and speculating about which "slave ship he was on" is not legal commentary. It is a racial attack designed to delegitimize a man because he reached conclusions his critics find inconvenient.
Thomas has called for dismantling race-based redistricting in multiple rulings, including after a recent Louisiana decision. His position is consistent and decades-long. Whether one agrees or not, it is a serious constitutional argument, not evidence of racial treachery.
The Alabama ruling is part of a broader wave of redistricting disputes now moving through the courts. Southern Republicans have already begun moving to redraw congressional maps following recent Supreme Court decisions, and the political stakes are enormous. Democrats stand to lose seats they gained under maps drawn by courts rather than legislatures.
Givan's anger is, at bottom, about those seats. The 2023 court-ordered map gave Democrats an extra foothold in Alabama. The Supreme Court just took it away. The political consequences for Reps. Sewell and Figures could be real. That is a legitimate grievance to raise through legitimate channels, legislative advocacy, legal challenges, public argument.
What it is not is a license to call a Supreme Court justice a racial slur on social media.
Meanwhile, Virginia Democrats have asked the Supreme Court to rescue their own rejected congressional map, underscoring how dependent the party has become on court-drawn districts to maintain its foothold in competitive states.
Fox News Digital reported Givan's remarks but noted no response from Thomas or the Supreme Court. No statement from Alabama Democratic leadership appeared in the reporting. No condemnation from national Democratic figures was cited.
That silence is its own statement. When the political class decides that racial attacks on a public official are tolerable, so long as the target holds the wrong views, it has abandoned the principle it claims to defend. Either racial slurs directed at a Black man are unacceptable, or they are a weapon of convenience. Givan's video, and the quiet that followed, suggest the latter.
If you want to know what a double standard looks like, you do not need a textbook. You just need a Facebook video from an Alabama state representative, and the deafening silence of everyone who would be screaming if the roles were reversed.