The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday said it would reargue Louisiana’s congressional redistricting plan in its next term, after this summer.
At issue is the Louisiana legislature’s creation of a Black-majority congressional district. A group of “non-African American” voters sued, claiming the district was an illegal racial gerrymander.
Opponents of the redistricting had argued that the state legislature had unconstitutionally relied on race in drawing new congressional district lines.
Louisiana’s population is roughly one-third black. But after the 2020 Census, the state legislature drew new congressional district lines that provided for only one majority-Black district in a state that has six congressional seats. That’s the same thing that Alabama did after the 2020 Census, only to be slapped down by the Supreme Court two years ago when a narrow court majority ruled that the state had illegally diluted the Black vote in violation of the Voting Rights Act.
In the wake of that decision, the Louisiana legislature, after losing before multiple courts, saw the handwriting on the wall and drew a new map that provided for a second majority-Black district. But in redrawing the district lines, the Republican-controlled legislature also sought to protect safe seats for two important GOP lawmakers, Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise.
Enter a group of voters identifying themselves as “non-African-American voters,” who objected to the redistricting as a racial gerrymander.
In oral arguments earlier this year, Louisiana’s lawyer told the high court that simply was not the case. It was an old-fashioned political gerrymander, he said, adding, “We’re talking about the Speaker of the House. No rational state gambles with those high-stakes seats.”
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