The Supreme Court will hear arguments on a Louisiana congressional redistricting map that created two majority-Black districts in the state rather than just one.
The appeal, likely to be argued early next year, will not affect this year’s elections. But it could be a vehicle for the high court to chip away further at the Voting Rights Act, the landmark Civil Rights-era law that bars voting practices or procedures that discriminate on the basis of race.
A long-running federal lawsuit in the state alleged that an earlier Republican-drawn map violated the VRA because it diluted the power of Black voters in the state.
That map, drawn by Republican legislators following the 2020 census, initially had one majority-Black district out of the state’s six, even though Black voters make up roughly a third of the population.
