Supreme Court takes up Louisiana racial gerrymandering dispute
The Supreme Court took up a thorny legal dispute from Louisiana involving the state's effort to draw a congressional district map while navigating claims it is unlawfully considering race.
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to decide a thorny legal dispute from Louisiana involving the state's effort to draw a congressional district map while navigating claims it is unlawfully considering race.
The case has no immediate impact on this year's elections in the state, which is using a map that includes two majority black districts out of six.
During the course of drawing a map based on 2020 census data, the Republican-led state has been sued from two directions.
One lawsuit claimed that the state had to draw a map containing two majority Black districts to comply with the federal Voting Rights Act. But once that case was resolved with a victory for the civil rights plaintiffs, the state's new map that was drawn to comply with that finding was challenged by a group of "non-African American" voters who said it violated the Constitution's 14th Amendment by discriminating against them.
A federal court struck the new map down, but with time running out to finalize the congressional districts before this year’s elections, state officials successfully asked the Supreme Court to put the lower court decision on hold in May.
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