The Supreme Court dealt a blow to race-based redistricting on Wednesday, finding that Louisiana’s second black-majority congressional district was created in violation of the Constitution, but stopping short of gutting Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.
The dispute stems from a challenge by a group of voters who identified as “non-African American” to a 2024 redistricting map adopted after a federal court invalidated the prior map for violating the VRA. While the state’s revised map added a second majority-black district to address those concerns, the court ultimately found, in a 6-3 decision, that the configuration crossed the line, ruling that the new map constituted an unconstitutional racial gerrymander.
“Compliance with Section 2, as properly construed, can provide such a reason,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the majority, while three Democrat-appointed justices dissented. “Correctly understood, Section 2 does not impose liability at odds with the Constitution, and it should not have imposed liability on Louisiana for its 2022 map. Compliance with Section 2 thus could not justify the State’s use of race-based redistricting here.”
Louisiana v. Callais was initially heard by the high court early last year, before the justices punted on a ruling in June 2025 and scheduled rearguments for October 2025. The rearguments late last year centered on whether Louisiana’s creation of a second black-majority district, drawn to comply with a previous court order based on Section 2 of the VRA, violates the 14th or 15th amendments of the Constitution.
The case was widely viewed as a direct challenge to the parameters for race-based legal challenges of congressional maps under Section 2 of the VRA, established by the Supreme Court’s 1986 ruling in Thornburg v. Gingles.
The Gingles standard found that if a minority group makes up a significant portion of a state’s population and lives in a sufficiently compact area, that group should be entitled to elect its preferred candidate via its own majority congressional district. The Gingles holding aimed to curb the unlawful dilution of minority groups’ voting power in elections by ensuring their representation through these VRA opportunity districts.
During rearguments in October 2025, the conservative majority on the Supreme Court appeared poised to toss out or significantly weaken the Gingles precedent. Justice Brett Kavanaugh, viewed as a key swing vote in the case after upholding Gingles in a 2023 ruling, questioned what the endpoint would be for when race should no longer be considered in the redistricting process.
Louisiana officials, who were sued by a group of white voters over the creation of the second black-majority district, ultimately asked the high court for clarity on race-based redistricting rules. The Callais lawsuit came years after a different lawsuit saw a court order the creation of the second black-majority district, which is now at the center of this case.
Officials from the Pelican State also urged the high court to strike the map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander and to strike down the Gingles standard as well.
KAVANAUGH QUESTIONS WHEN ‘ENDPOINT’ FOR RACE-BASED REDISTRICTING WILL BE
As many as 12 Democratic congressional districts could be redrawn into Republican ones, with Gingles now effectively ended as a legal standard, according to one analysis by the New York Times. Another report by left-wing group Fair Fight Action found that as many as 19 Democratic congressional seats could be in jeopardy.
The Callais case is one of a trio of cases before the Supreme Court this term that could have significant impacts on November’s midterm elections and the 2028 elections, alongside cases involving campaign finance and counting late-arriving mail ballots.