As Supreme Court weighs Louisiana map, lawmakers head back to work
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Louisiana lawmakers return to Baton Rouge on Thursday for a special session to finagle 2026 election dates and deadlines.
Why it matters: Any changes are the ultimate wait-and-see reaction to a pending Supreme Court ruling that could upend an already complicated batch of elections next year.
The intrigue: With Louisiana's current congressional map on the Supreme Court chopping block, state lawmakers are looking for any flexibility on the calendar.
- The changes they can legally make are fairly limited, according to The Times-Picayune, but they hope to push off qualifying long enough that candidates can know exactly what the map looks like before they enter a race.
The big picture: The state is scheduled to vote on its congressional representation next year.
- But with Louisiana v. Callais, the court seems poised to scrap a key provision of the Voting Rights Act, removing the legal basis for using race as a factor in redistricting, making it a lot harder for minority voters to keep or get electoral representation.
- If that happens, Republicans could get rid of nearly all congressional Democratic representation in Southern states, according to a New York Times analysis, with Louisiana among them. The timing of that would depend on each state's election calendar, but it could conceivably happen by the 2028 election cycle.
State of play: About a third of Louisiana's population is Black, according to census data.
- Of the six representatives who make up Louisiana's current congressional delegation, four are white Republicans (Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Reps. Clay Higgins and Julia Letlow).
- Two Louisiana representatives are Black Democrats (Reps. Troy Carter and Cleo Fields, who was elected to replace white Republican Garrett Graves under the current, contested version of Louisiana's map).
Zoom in: Next year's congressional elections were already going to be a bit confusing in Louisiana.
- The state is moving to a closed party primary system for a handful of elections, including for U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives.
- That change brings with it key deadlines and dates for qualifying and party primaries, in addition to the general election Nov. 3, 2026.
What's next: The session is scheduled to begin at 2pm Thursday. Lawmakers have a deadline to finish their work by 6pm on Nov. 13.