The scurrilous attempt by North Carolina Republicans to suppress the rising power of black voters was struck down on Friday by a federal appeals court that concluded that the state’s voting strictures “target African-Americans with almost surgical precision.”

The decision means that the voting power of black citizens in the important swing state will not be hobbled in November by a repressive 2013 law that the court found was steeped in blatant racism, in violation of the Constitution. “Because of race, the Legislature enacted one of the largest restrictions of the franchise in modern North Carolina history,” the court ruled.

The court, in finding that the law was designed as a deliberate tool to reduce the African-American vote, is the latest to beat back attempts by Republican statehouses to interfere with minority and new voters.

This month, a federal appeals court blocked the voter identification law in Texas, a law that had the effect of disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of people, with a disproportionate impact on black and Latino voters. And a federal court in Wisconsin this month found new voters suffered discrimination under a strict new photo ID law passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature.