Supreme Court Faces New Decision in Major Voting Rights Case

Source: Newsweek

Published May 01, 2026 at 01:30 PM EDT updated May 01, 2026 at 01:31 PM EDT


The Supreme Court is facing a new decision on how to proceed in a Louisiana redistricting case just days after the justices released an opinion that critics said weakened the Voting Rights Act. The court announced its decision in Louisiana v. Callais on Wednesday, ruling that a map drawn by the state was an unconstitutional racial gerrymander and that the Voting Rights Act did not require Louisiana to create an additional majority-minority district.

Attorneys for Phillip Callais and other respondents in the initial Supreme Court case submitted an application on Wednesday asking the court to immediately issue its judgment and send a certified copy to a Louisiana district court. Under court rules, the clerk does not send a copy of a judgment to a district court for at least 32 days from the decision’s release, unless the court decides to expedite the process. Attorneys for several plaintiffs in the initial case, excluding Louisiana, filed a response on Thursday opposing the application and requesting that the court grant them the opportunity to seek a rehearing. Louisiana took no position on the application.

“I think these requests are unusual, but this is not a usual case,” Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor and the president of West Coast Trial Lawyers, told Newsweek. Rahmani said a district court cannot implement a higher court’s ruling until the decision is sent to the lower court in a process called "issuing the mandate.” “There’s some period of time because parties can ask for a rehearing, which is rarely granted, frankly, rarely requested at the Supreme Court level,” Rahmani said.

Michael Gerhardt, the Burton Craige distinguished professor of jurisprudence at the University of North Carolina, said the application “is not unusual.” “It comes up often in contexts like these where the legislature is moving faster than the usual process for implementing the Supreme Court’s order in the case.

Read more: https://www.newsweek.com/supreme-court-faces-new-decision-louisiana-voting-rights-case-11904178