Louisiana Suspends Congressional Primaries After Supreme Court Ruling

Louisiana’s congressional race has been thrown into immediate disarray, with the state suspending only its U.S. House primaries after the Supreme Court struck down the map that governed them. Early voting had been set to begin May 2, with primaries scheduled for May 16 and June 27, but the ruling forced election officials to stop the federal races while the rest of the May 16 ballot remains on track.

Gov. Jeff Landry and Attorney General Liz Murrill said the state is currently enjoined from carrying out congressional elections under the current map. In a joint move, Landry’s office suspended the closed party primaries only for House seats, signaling that Louisiana now has to reset a federal election calendar that was already in motion and, for campaigns, already cost real time and money.

The Supreme Court’s 6-3 ruling in Louisiana v. Callais came on April 29, 2026, and found the state’s congressional map to be an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. The map had been enacted under SB 8 during the 2024 First Extraordinary Session, after lawmakers added a second majority-Black district that stretched between Shreveport and Baton Rouge. That district was the product of an earlier voting-rights fight over Louisiana’s 2021 map, which Black voters and organizations challenged as diluting Black voting power under Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.

The current standoff underscores how redistricting can reorder democracy on the ground. Louisiana’s 2022 map had produced a 5-1 Republican delegation, while the 2024 redraw shifted the state to its current 4-2 split. A revised map could give Republicans a chance to win at least one more seat in November, as the state becomes part of a broader national redistricting scramble set off by partisan mapmaking in Texas, California, and now Florida.

The practical fallout falls hardest on voters and candidates who had been preparing for a fast-moving spring election. Early voting was set to open Saturday, and the state had to tell voters that the House contests were off even as other races proceeded. Democratic state Sen. Royce Duplessis warned that the suspension would create mass confusion among voters and change the rules midstream. Civil-rights groups, including the NAACP Louisiana State Conference and the Power Coalition for Equity and Justice, had hailed the second majority-Black district as a major step toward fair representation. Now Louisiana must redraw again before it can send its six House districts back to the ballot box.