SCOTUS removes itself from Louisiana redistricting debacle

BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) - After the U.S. Supreme Court ordered Alabama to redraw its congressional map for the same reason voting rights violation our state has been accused of, it seemed certain Louisiana would be ordered to do the same. But the high court’s latest decision to distance itself from the situation has everyone wondering where this leaves us.

“This isn’t surprising, that this system would move the goal line once again after so many folks worked so hard to get a just ruling in court,” said former President of the Baton Rouge NAACP chapter, Eugene Collins.

Collins said he was stunned when he learned about the Supreme Court’s decision. Quick recap, the 2020 census found Louisiana’s black population had grown to one-third of the state which has 6 congressional districts and only 1 is black majority. The legislature failed to draw a new map to add a second black-majority district to mirror the change in population. Fast forward a couple of years and after several failed attempts to rectify the state’s potential voting rights violation, SCOTUS announced it would, for now, no longer intervene.

“What this means is there a whole lot of uncertainties, of unknowns leading into what was supposed to be another district that’s supposed to lean minority right? So, that’s gonna push all of that back,” Collins added.

The unforeseen shakeup to the political landscape leaves Democrats, who had hoped to have a second black-majority district ahead of the 2024 elections, now find themselves in limbo for what the future holds.

“My guess is that they’ll try to draw a district that will change it to some degree but maybe not to the degree that people want and we’ll be right back in court and every delay means the more likelihood that the elections next year will be run as they were in the previous cycle,” said WAFB Political Analyst Jim Engster.

Qualifying for the 2024 election is less than nine months away.

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