Louisiana enacts new congressional districts in a bid to give the GOP
another seat
[May 30, 2026]
By JACK BROOK and MARC LEVY
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Louisiana enacted a new map of congressional
districts Friday that is designed to help Republicans pick up a seat
while eliminating one of the state’s two majority-Black House districts,
both of which are represented by Democrats.
Republican Gov. Jeff Landry signed the plan hours after it
overwhelmingly passed the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature.
Approval of the new House map came a month after the U.S. Supreme Court
struck down Louisiana’s current map — with its two majority-Black
districts — as an illegal racial gerrymander, weakening the landmark
1965 federal Voting Rights Act. That decision intensified a national
redistricting battle fueled by President Donald Trump’s efforts to
protect Republicans’ slim U.S. House majority in the midterm elections.
Louisiana is one of several Southern states now redrawing their maps to
help Republicans.
Louisiana Republicans had considered drawing a map giving the party a
shot at winning all six of the state’s U.S. House seats. But that would
have required adding more registered Democrats to Republican-held
districts, potentially backfiring with GOP losses.
The map approved Friday in a 28-10 state Senate vote along party lines
reflected Republican arguments that a 5-1 map is safer for the GOP and
better protects U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson from facing a difficult
reelection. Republicans currently hold four of Louisiana’s six
congressional seats.
‘Vicious race to the bottom’
Democrats contend that the new map is racially gerrymandered to squeeze
more Black voters — who tend to be registered Democrats — into a single
district.
Democratic state Sen. Royce Duplessis pointed out during floor debate
Friday that some other Southern states, such as South Carolina, had
refused to redraw their maps in the middle of an election year, and said
Louisiana is participating in a “vicious, vicious race to the bottom.”
The bill's sponsor, Republican state Sen. Jay Morris, repeatedly
insisted that party affiliation, not race, drove district boundaries.
“I purposely put more Democrats into District 2 to make the remaining
districts better performing for Republicans,” Morris said at one point.
Morris said he told the map demographers to avoid including any data on
race or including those statistics in information shared with lawmakers
before the vote.
Democratic state Sen. Sam Jenkins told Morris, “I think it’s a racially
gerrymandered district that's going to get us into a lot of trouble
here."
“Agree to disagree,” Morris told Jenkins.
More litigation expected in Louisiana
Louisiana is currently using a map ordered by a lower court in 2024 to
comply with the Voting Rights Act by including a second district with a
majority-Black population.
That map, however, was challenged in court, and the Supreme Court
responded on April 30 by striking it down as an illegal racial
gerrymander.
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A person opposed to the redistricting plan reacts as she leaves the
Louisiana House chambers after the plan to eliminate a
majority-Black congressional district, in response to a U.S. Supreme
Court ruling, was passed in Baton Rouge, La., Thursday, May 28,
2026. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)
Landry postponed the state’s closed U.S. House primary slated for
May 16. He later signed a law making the U.S. primary open and
shifted the date to Nov. 3 to allow time for Republican lawmakers to
draw and pass a new map. All candidates, regardless of party
affiliation, will be on the ballot for voters in their district.
The new map redraws Democratic U.S. Rep. Cleo Fields' district,
clustering it around predominantly white communities in the Baton
Rouge area and southern Louisiana. It also adds part of Baton Rouge
to a heavily Democratic, majority-Black district based in New
Orleans currently represented by Democratic U.S. Rep. Troy Carter.
More lawsuits were expected over the new map.
Democrats say the map could draw a legal challenge over racial
gerrymandering, and the ACLU of Louisiana suggested Friday that it
could sue, calling the map a “racial gerrymander hiding behind the
thin veneer of partisanship” and warning that "this fight is just
beginning.”
Meanwhile, the victorious plaintiffs in the U.S. Supreme Court's
decision criticized the Legislature's map earlier this week for
leaving a majority-Black district in place.
Nationwide battle over district lines
In the weeks following the Supreme Court’s decision, several other
Republican-controlled Southern states have seized upon a weakened
federal Voting Rights Act to try to redraw their own congressional
districts.
So far, Republicans are winning the redistricting contest. But that
doesn’t necessarily mean they will win a narrowly divided U.S. House
in November. Republicans think they could gain as many as 15 seats
from their redistricting efforts so far, while Democrats think they
could gain six seats from new districts in California and Utah.
Meanwhile, a court decision in Wisconsin on Friday could give
Democrats a new avenue to pick up seats in 2028.
The liberal-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court said it would hear an
appeal of a case filed by a bipartisan coalition of business
executives that seeks to redraw the state’s Republican-friendly
congressional districts. Republicans hold six of the state’s eight
House seats, but only two are considered competitive.
A three-judge panel dismissed the case in April. Those who filed the
lawsuit weren't seeking a ruling in time for the 2026 election.
Instead, they are asking the state Supreme Court to send the case
back to the lower court for a trial on their claims, which would
likely not take place until 2027.
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