Louisiana will maintain a brand new congressional map that solely has one majority-Black district in it—at the least for now—after an appeals court docket late Thursday blocked a decrease court docket ruling that discovered the map unlawfully discriminated towards Black voters.
A streetcar passes a polling station on December 10, 2016 in New Orleans, Louisiana.
The fifth Circuit Court docket of Appeals—thought of to be one of the conservative federal appeals courts within the nation—issued a keep late Thursday night time, which blocked a district court docket’s order directing Louisiana to attract new maps that wouldn’t unfairly dilute Black constituents’ votes.
The appeals judges didn’t clarify their determination, which blocks the decrease court docket’s ruling simply because the case strikes ahead and till a last determination is made.
U.S. District Choose Shelly D. Dick dominated Monday that the map the state initially got here up with possible violates the Voting Rights Act, which bars congressional maps which are racially discriminatory, and issued a preliminary injunction that blocked Louisiana from utilizing its map because the case moved ahead.
The plaintiffs difficult the map, together with the NAACP, argued the state ought to create a second district that may be composed of majority-Black voters, noting the map the legislature handed meant Black voters solely managed roughly 17% of the state’s congressional districts regardless of making up 31.2% of its voting-age inhabitants.
Dick sided with them and dominated the legislature’s map would “irreparably hurt” the Black voters who had been plaintiffs within the case, whereas the maps the plaintiffs proposed—which had two majority-Black districts—“would really … enable Black voters a real alternative to elect the candidate of their alternative.”
The NAACP Authorized Protection Fund, which represented the plaintiffs within the case, has not but responded to a request for touch upon the appeals court docket’s ruling.
“Plaintiffs have demonstrated that they may endure an irreparable hurt if voting takes place within the 2022 Louisiana congressional elections based mostly on a redistricting plan that violates federal legislation,” Dick wrote in her ruling initially blocking the map, additionally disputing the state authorities’s argument that attempting to attract up a brand new map rapidly earlier than the election would “act like [a]
“Louisiana’s 2022 congressional map … continues the State of Louisiana’s lengthy historical past of maximizing political energy for white residents by disenfranchising and discriminating towards Black Louisianans,” the challengers argued of their preliminary lawsuit towards the map, saying the state’s map packs “massive numbers of Black voters” right into a single district and makes Black voters within the different 5 districts “an ineffective minority unable to take part equally within the electoral course of.”
The Louisiana legislature had known as a particular session to attract up new maps after Dick issued her ruling, which directed them to provide you with a brand new solution to divide up the districts by June 20. The New Orleans Advocate reviews it’s now up within the air what that particular session will appear like. Now that it’s been known as, the state Structure could make it unimaginable to easily name it off, so lawmakers nonetheless might need to convene after which instantly adjourn.
Louisiana is considered one of various states that at the moment are going through authorized battles over their congressional maps, as states redraw maps in response to the 2020 Census. Whereas almost all states’ congressional maps have been accepted at this level, 15 states’ maps (together with Louisiana) are nonetheless tied up in litigation, in keeping with a tracker compiled by FiveThirtyEight. Florida’s redistricting maps have additionally been a supply of concern for allegedly disenfranchising Black voters—and had been equally upheld by an appeals court docket—as an example, and Kansas’ map has been challenged for partisan and racial gerrymandering and will make it tougher for the state’s sole Democratic member of Congress to get reelected. The U.S. Supreme Court docket will hear arguments subsequent time period on Alabama’s congressional map, after quickly permitting the state to make use of a map that’s been challenged for allegedly discriminating towards Black voters.
fifth Circuit stays redistrict order, places particular session up within the air (New Orleans Advocate)
Choose rejects Louisiana congressional map with just one Black district (NBC Information)
What Redistricting Seems to be Like In Each State (FiveThirtyEight)
More fog is predicted for Southeast Louisiana on Wednesday morning after a serious pile-up in foggy conditions on Tuesday.
The Dense Fog Advisory will go into effect for Southeast Louisiana at midnight on Wednesday, December 18th and last through about 10 a.m. the same day.
According to WDSU News, fog was seen in the areas of The Causeway bridge and Lake Pontchartrain on Monday and Tuesday mornings. Poor visibility caused by the fog is thought to have caused the 50 vehicle pile-up on the Causeway bridge on Tuesday morning. 33 people were hurt and at least 30 were left stranded on The Causeway bridge in the incident, which The Causeway Police Department says may be the worst accident in the bridge’s history.
Wednesday’s fog is predicted to be more impactful than the previous two days, which did not see official fog advisories. Drivers are advised to use caution during their morning commutes.
BATON ROUGE – Tuesday, the state’s Electoral College members cast their officials votes for U.S. president.
The eight members will cast their votes under oath for the next U.S. president and vice president.
All eight of them will be voting for president-elect Donald Trump after the Republican claimed the Louisiana votes.
You can watch the process on our YouTube page here:
BATON ROUGE, La. (WAFB) – The Louisiana Legislative Auditor released a report on December 16 focused on the seclusion, restraint, and abuse of special education students in public schools. This is the third audit from the LLA in the last two years as it has looked into the complaint process and monitoring of special education services in previous reports.
This stems from a nationwide report released in 2023 by the U.S. Department of Education’s office for civil rights. That report found that students in special education classes make up 14% of the total K-12 enrollment, but account for 81% of physically restrained students, and 75% of students secluded.
According to Gina Brown, the audit manager for the Louisiana Legislative Auditor, nobody is monitoring the use of seclusion and restraint across the public school systems in Louisiana.
“It’s not required anywhere to be monitored and so it’s not being monitored. LDOE it is our opinion that LDOE does have the authority to monitor this,” Brown says.
The Louisiana Department of Education responded to the audit, saying it “disagrees with the LLA’s contention that LDOE has the necessary authority to monitor how school systems use seclusion and restraint.”
Brown says in Louisiana, school systems are required to report the number of incidents where students are physically restrained or secluded. She says the data is collected but not really used for anything.
“We found after going into field work and interviewing teachers and talking to those different school districts, we found a discrepancy between what was being reported to the department. Compared to the number of instances that were actually happening at the school,” Brown says.
Back in 2022, the Louisiana Legislature approved $8.8 million for the department of education to give to schools to install cameras in special education classrooms. The funding went into effect in 2023, but so far only $2.2 million has been spent. Brown says that is most likely because parents are unaware that they have to actually request cameras be put into those classrooms for the school to then require it.
“If parents were more informed that they can request this form, they can request a camera, they may be more likely. We might see more of this funding being used,” Brown says.
According to Ted Beasley, the communications director for the Louisiana Department of Education, there have been a total of 181 requests for cameras and 988 cameras installed. Some schools did it proactively.
Another potential problem the audit highlights is the requirements around certifications for teachers. Public school teachers are required to be certified, but they are not required to be certified in charter schools. Brown also says Louisiana is the only state with no code of ethics out of the 10 states they surveyed. Louisiana also does not have a way to sanction the licenses of teachers accused of mistreating students but not convicted of a crime.
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