<\/p>\n
In a 6-3 decision, the conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a newly drawn majority-black congressional district in Louisiana. \u00a0Chief Justice John Roberts described it as a “snake,” as it stretches more than 200 miles from Shreveport to Baton Rouge.<\/p>\n
In the majority opinion, Justice Samuel Alito wrote, “That map is an unconstitutional gerrymander.”<\/p>\n
The ruling also weakens Section 2 of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965, aimed at reducing discrimination in voting. In a dissent for the three liberal justices, Elena Kagan wrote, “The consequences are likely to be far-reaching and grave. Today’s decision renders Section 2 all but a dead letter.”<\/p>\n
Political reaction to the ruling was split along party lines, with President Trump saying he “likes it.”<\/p>\n
The decision puts Louisiana Democratic Rep. Cleo Fields at risk for losing his seat. In a statement, Fields said the decision’s “practical effect is to make it far harder for minority communities to challenge redistricting maps that dilute their political voice.\u201d<\/p>\n
The ruling comes as states nationwide are redrawing maps to gain a partisan advantage in the midterm elections. On Wednesday, the Florida legislature became the latest state to approve a new congressional map, which gives Republicans an edge. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Florida joins nine other states, some majority-Democrat and some majority-Republican, to create new district boundaries for elections to increase the potential for their party to gain seats in the House of Representatives and impact the balance of power in Washington.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In a 6-3 decision, the conservative justices on the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a newly drawn majority-black congressional district in Louisiana. \u00a0Chief Justice John Roberts described it as a “snake,” as it stretches more than 200 miles from Shreveport to Baton Rouge. In the majority opinion, Justice Samuel Alito wrote, “That map is an<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27960,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[2655,316,2656,9255,9252,9253,9254,421],"class_list":{"0":"post-27959","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jesus","8":"tag-congressional","9":"tag-court","10":"tag-district","11":"tag-drawn","12":"tag-invalidates","13":"tag-louisianas","14":"tag-newly","15":"tag-supreme"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27959","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27959"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27959\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27959"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27959"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biblelon.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27959"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}