WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Wednesday appeared ready to gut a key tool of the Voting Rights Act that has helped root out racial discrimination in voting for more than a half century, a change that would boost Republican electoral prospects, particularly across the South.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh argued that the Voting Rights Act must sunset after an undetermined amount of time. Justice Amy Coney Barrett proposed imposing a limit on Congress’s power to remedy discrimination — one that the Court has applied in nonvoting cases — on election-related laws like the VRA.