Federal Panel Throws Out Louisiana’s Redrawn Map With Majority-Black Districts

The judges said that race had played a ‘predominate role’ and that a new congressional district constituted an ‘impermissible racial gerrymander.’

Sign at a runoff election for Louisiana governor at a polling station at Quitman High School in Quitman, La., on Nov. 16, 2019. Matt Sullivan/Getty Images

A panel of federal judges has thrown out Louisiana’s recently-drawn congressional map that had created a second majority-black district in the state, likely sending the case to the Supreme Court.

In a 2-1 vote on April 30, the three-judge panel of the U.S. District Court in Monroe, Louisiana sided with voters who opposed the new map, finding that it violated the Equal Protection Clause under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.