The Louisiana Legislature on Saturday ended its special session on congressional redistricting without producing a map with two Black-majority districts, as a federal district judge overseeing litigation about the issue instructed lawmakers to do.
U.S. District Judge Shelly Dick had ordered state lawmakers to submit a new redistricting map containing two majority-minority districts by June 22, but lawmakers failed to agree on such a map. That effectively places a final decision on the congressional map in the hands of the federal court system, though it’s unclear which court will ultimately decide the issue.
The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals scheduled a hearing on the matter on July 8, but Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry has called on U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito to have the court issue an administrative stay on the Louisiana case. The court application contends the case could be consolidated with a similar one in Alabama that the Supreme Court will hear later this year – or else the Louisiana case could be put on hold until Merrill v. Milligan in Alabama is decided.
“We will continue to defend both the will of the Legislature and the U.S. Constitution all the way up to the Supreme Court,” Cory Dennis, Landry’s press secretary, told the Louisiana Record in an email.
Dick’s actions could place Louisiana’s electoral system in disarray as the state prepares to administer this year’s elections, according to Landry’s application to the U.S. Supreme Court.
“The district court’s ruling upends statutory deadlines with a promise of more to come, throws the election process into chaos and creates confusion statewide, all of which undermines confidence in the integrity of upcoming congressional elections,” the emergency application states.
Gov. John Bel Edwards expressed disappointment in the state Legislature for not approving a map with two Black-majority districts, noting that the voting-age population is one-third Black and that Black voters in two of the state’s six congressional districts should have an opportunity to select candidates of their choice.
As state residents were about to celebrate the new Juneteenth holiday, “it is clear that our African-American brothers and sisters are still fighting for fair representation,” Edwards said in a prepared statement. “Louisiana, we can and should do better than this.”