Supreme Court Strikes Down Louisiana Congressional Map
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court struck down Louisiana’s congressional map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander, in a decision that could have far-reaching implications for a dozen or more Democratic-held districts across the South and around the country. The immediate effects of the decision on the 2026 midterms, however, are less clear. And as Democrats continue to perform strongly in competitive House districts across the country, it’s unlikely that this decision changes the underlying assessment that Democrats are favored to take back the House.
The Callais decision, authored by Justice Samuel Alito and joined by his five conservative colleagues, did not strike down Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, as some had anticipated. But Alito altered its interpretation to such a degree that the law, which for decades has helped protect majority-Black and majority-Hispanic seats from being dismantled by aggressive gerrymanders, may in effect be toothless moving forward. In her dissent, Justice Elena Kagan wrote that the “decision renders Section 2 all but a dead letter.”
In practice, the Court’s decision likely comes too late to affect most states’ redistricting processes ahead of the 2026 midterm elections, even as the redistricting wars have raged on for the past 10 months. And because the Court did not explicitly overturn Section 2, it’s not obvious the extent to which mapmakers now have license to dismantle minority-opportunity districts with abandon.
First, the…
