Louisiana postpones primaries as states rush to redraw districts after supreme court ruling | US voting rights
Louisiana decided Thursday to postpone its May primary, a move that came as other Southern states also scramble to redraw congressional districts in response to Wednesday’s Supreme Court ruling that severely weakened the landmark Voting Rights Act.
Before the Supreme Court’s decision eliminating a key protection against racial discrimination in voter mapping, some states had already begun launching processes to redraw districts and reduce Black voting power. Other states have now followed suit, with governors calling for special sessions to redraw congressional districts, potentially before the November midterm elections.
Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry and Attorney General Liz Murrill, both Republicans, said in a joint statement that the state could no longer use its current districts to hold primaries after the Supreme Court ruling. Early voting was scheduled to begin Saturday, ahead of the May 16 primary.
“The state is currently prohibited from conducting congressional elections under the current map,” Landry and Murrill said in a statement posted on social media Thursday. “We are working together with the Legislature and the Secretary of State’s Office to develop a path forward. »
Voting districts are typically redrawn once a decade, after the census. Last year, Donald Trump triggered a round of mid-decade redistricting after urging Texas Republicans to give the GOP a boost in the midterm elections. The California Democrats responded in turn. From there, several other states began promoting redistricting, as well as those whose maps were already tied up in state and federal courts.
State legislatures now have a new opportunity, and several Southern states have already acted or indicated they will soon.
Although it is unclear how many states will be able to redraw their maps before the November midterm elections given that filing deadlines and, in some cases, primaries have passed in many states, Republicans are expected to take extreme measures to act quickly.
Before the ink on the justices’ decision was dry, Florida’s Republican-controlled legislature, called into special session by Gov. Ron DeSantis in recent weeks, passed new congressional maps to grant four additional seats to the Republican Party. The map, which was already in the works before the Supreme Court’s decision, gives Republicans the edge in 24 of the state’s 28 seats in the House.
“DeSantis’ new extreme gerrymander was drawn behind closed doors because he knows voters overwhelmingly oppose this partisan takeover,” John Bisognano, chairman of the Democratic National Redistricting Committee, said in a statement. “Instead of standing up for their constituents, Florida Republicans just voted to silence millions of Floridians in service of Donald Trump’s plot to steal the 2026 midterm elections.”
While Florida has advanced the issue of redistricting more than any other state since the Supreme Court’s decision, other Republican-controlled states appeared poised to follow.
Tate Reeves, the governor of Mississippi, announced that 21 days after the Supreme Court’s decision, the state legislature would return for a special session to address redistricting, which had been on hold pending the decision.
Charles Taylor, executive director of the Mississippi chapter of the NAACP, said the organization was already working to respond to both the ruling and the special session.
“Too often in this country, Black voters bear the brunt of political theater and I want to be clear: the Republican Party and power are entirely about the dilution of Black voting power,” he said. “Mississippi is the blackest state in the country and we have a governor and legislature that are biting their pieces, not to create equality, but to continue to suppress black voices and black people in our state. It’s a sad day, but we are ready to fight.”
Reeves celebrated the Supreme Court’s decision in an article on X.
“First Dobbs. Now Callais,” he wrote. “Just Mississippi and Louisiana here to save our country!” »
Like Louisiana, Alabama was sued after the 2020 redistricting cycle for violating Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall said the state “will move as quickly as possible to apply this decision to Alabama’s redistricting efforts.” The state has two majority-black districts, including one that voted for the first time only two years ago.
In Tennessee, shortly after the Supreme Court’s decision, Republican senator and gubernatorial candidate Marsha Blackburn wrote an article on X targeting the state’s only majority-black district.
“I urge our state Legislature to reconvene to redistrict another Republican seat in Memphis,” she wrote alongside a photo of Tennessee redrawn entirely in red. “This is essential to cementing @realDonaldTrump’s agenda and America’s golden age.”
On Thursday, Trump weighed in, posting on Truth Social that he had spoken to Bill Lee, the governor of Tennessee.
“I had a very good conversation with Governor Bill Lee of Tennessee this morning in which he said he would work hard to correct the unconstitutional flaw in the congressional maps of the great state of Tennessee,” he wrote. “Likewise, every other political representative in Tennessee has promised to do this. This should give us an additional seat.”
