October 15, 2025
C-SPAN: By a vote of 6-3, the Supreme Court ruled that Louisiana’s congressional map was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. The majority said that states can almost never consider race when drawing maps to comply with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits racial discrimination in voting.
The case made its way to the Court after Louisiana passed a congressional map which contained only one majority-Black district out of six total districts. Approximately one-third of Louisiana’s population is Black. A lawsuit followed, and a federal court ruled this map violated Section 2 of the VRA. As a result, Louisiana created a second majority-Black district. A group of “non-Black voters” then sued, and a different federal court ruled in their favor, holding that race impermissibly predominated in the creation of this second district.
The high court first heard arguments in March 2025, but then reheard the case again in October with the 14th and 15th Amendments in mind.