Louisiana advances plan for new US House districts as Georgia joins
redistricting effort for 2028
[May 14, 2026]
By JACK BROOK, JEFF AMY, SOPHIE BATES and DAVID A. LIEB
BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Republican senators in Louisiana advanced a plan
Wednesday to eliminate one of two majority-Black congressional seats
before the November midterm elections while Georgia's governor announced
that he will call lawmakers back to work to redraw legislative voting
districts for the 2028 elections.
The developments showed the far-reaching ripples of a recent U.S.
Supreme Court ruling that struck down Louisiana's congressional map as
an illegal racial gerrymander, weakening the protections of the federal
Voting Rights Act. The decision has prompted various Republican-led
states to try to dismantle districts with large minority populations
that have elected Democrats.
Since the court's ruling, Tennessee and Alabama already have acted to
implement different House maps that could help Republicans win an
additional seat in the November elections, where control of the closely
divided chamber is at stake. A similar effort fizzled Tuesday in the
South Carolina Senate but may not be over.
The redistricting efforts to undo minority districts are the latest in a
10-month-long national redistricting battle that already has involved
about one-third of the states. It gained steam when President Donald
Trump urged Texas Republicans last year to redraw House districts in an
attempt to win more seats in the midterm elections. Democrats in
California responded with their own new districts. Numerous Republican
states have redistricted since then.
Republicans think they could gain as many as 15 seats so far from new
House maps in Texas, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Florida, Tennessee
and Alabama. Democrats, meanwhile, think they could gain six seats from
new maps in California and Utah. The Virginia Supreme Court last week
struck down a redistricting effort that could have yielded four more
winnable seats for Democrats.
Georgia is the first to target the 2028 elections
Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp called a special legislative session
on redistricting to begin June 17, the day after runoffs will settle
party nominees for the November elections. Kemp has said he doesn’t want
to change Georgia’s voting districts for this year's elections, because
some ballots already have been cast for Tuesday’s first round of
primaries.
The governor’s proclamation is the first to focus on the 2028 elections
since the Supreme Court's ruling in the Louisiana case. Other states
could follow, including Democratic states such as New York that were
already looking at ways to enact new legislative districts by the next
presidential election.
By acting now, Georgia Republicans could guard against the possibility
that a Democrat could win the governor's race in November and veto new
voting districts if the legislature had waited to act until its regular
session next year.
Five of Georgia’s 14 U.S. House members are Black Democrats. The easiest
target for Republicans could be U.S. Rep. Sanford Bishop’s district in
southwest Georgia. Republicans could also try to pick off one or more of
the four Democrats who represent parts of the Atlanta area, but
spreading out too many Democrats could make more Republican districts
competitive.
Kemp’s proclamation allows new boundaries not only for U.S. House
districts but also for the state Senate and state House. A court
previously ordered some state House and Senate districts be redrawn to
help Black voters elect more candidates, voiding a map the
GOP-controlled legislature drew after the 2020 Census. Republicans could
choose to revert to that map or take a more aggressive path, especially
in the 180-member House, where the GOP’s majority has shrunk over time
to 99 seats.
Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock said Wednesday he would “fight this
with everything I have.”
“There is an extreme movement in this country that will stop at nothing
to hold on to power, even if it means stripping representation away from
millions,” Warnock wrote in an online post.
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Protestors fill the halls in the Louisiana Legislature in Baton
Rouge during a Senate committee hearing Friday, May 8, 2026 on
redistricting. (AP Photo/Jack Brook)
Louisiana map resembles 2022 districts
The Louisiana Senate could vote Thursday on the new House map
advanced by a redistricting committee.
The plan keeps a New Orleans-based, majority-Black district
represented by Democratic U.S. Rep. Troy Carter while also including
a portion of Baton Rouge. It significantly reshapes the 6th
District, represented by Democratic U.S. Rep. Cleo Fields, which
currently snakes northwest from Baton Rouge to Shreveport to create
a second majority-Black district. That district would instead be
clustered around predominantly white communities in southern
Louisiana around Baton Rouge.
Fields, a Baton Rouge resident, said he won't decide whether to seek
reelection until the maps are finalized. But he said won't challenge
Carter in a primary.
“I’ve said from day one, I have no interest in running against Troy
Carter. Period,” Fields told The Associated Press. “The real issue
is not whether I serve another second in Congress. The real issue is
whether or not a person like me will have the opportunity to serve
in Congress.”
State Sen. Jay Morris, a Republican who sponsored the revised map,
said the new districts are very similar to those used in 2022 that
resulted in five Republicans and one Democrat winning election.
A federal judge struck down the 2022 map for violating the Voting
Rights Act. Then in 2023, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Alabama
had to create its own second largely Black congressional district.
In light of the Alabama ruling, the Louisiana Legislature passed a
revised map, creating a second majority-Black district that was used
in the 2024 elections. That map also was challenged, leading to last
month's U.S. Supreme Court ruling that Louisiana's districts relied
too heavily on race. The Supreme Court followed with a decision also
overturning a judicial order mandating that Alabama use a House map
with two largely Black congressional districts.
Republican Gov. Jeff Landry postponed Louisiana's U.S. House
primaries, scheduled for Saturday, until either July 15 or a date to
be determined by the Legislature to allow time for new districts to
be put in place.
Mississippi calls off special session
Republican Gov. Tate Reeves on Wednesday called off next week’s
special legislative session that had been planned to redraw
Mississippi Supreme Court districts. But he said he expects
lawmakers to redraw the state’s congressional, legislative and
Supreme Court districts before the 2027 elections.
In a social media post, Reeves said there is no longer an immediate
need to redraw Supreme Court districts.
A federal judge had previously ordered the districts be redrawn,
ruling that the current map violated the Voting Rights Act by
diluting the power of Black voters. The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals overturned that ruling this week, following the Supreme
Court decision on Louisiana’s districts. The case will now return to
a lower court for further argument.
Mississippi already held primaries for its 2026 congressional
elections. Any redistricting by Republicans ahead of the 2028
elections likely would target U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, the only
Democrat among four House members.
___
Amy reported from Atlanta, Bates from Jackson, Mississippi, and Lieb
from Jefferson City, Missouri.
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