Tennessee session targets Memphis; South Carolina eyes Jim Clyburn district
Republican lawmakers in multiple Southern states moved quickly this week to redraw U.S. House districts, stepping up efforts after a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling that opened the door for changes ahead of the November midterm elections. Tennessee protesters gathered outside the state Capitol as lawmakers started a special legislative session that could reshape the state’s lone Democratic-held congressional seat centered on Memphis. In South Carolina, Republican leaders said they intend to try to eliminate a House district held by longtime Black Democratic Rep. Jim Clyburn. Louisiana also turned to new maps after the Supreme Court struck down the state’s existing district lines, and Alabama lawmakers advanced a procedure that could lead to a special congressional primary if courts allow new districts.
In Tennessee, the session began as protesters assembled and shouted “shame, shame, shame” inside hallways and near the chamber. On the Senate floor, Sen. Raumesh Akbari, a Black Democrat from Memphis, called the redistricting “an act of hate.” Earlier Tuesday at a rally, state Rep. Justin Pearson, who represents Memphis and is running for Congress, denounced the Republican plan as a “racist redistricting.” U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen, a white Democrat whose district is based in Memphis, said the Memphis-based seat predates the Voting Rights Act and described the district as “a district that is compact, and it has community purpose.”
Republican Gov. Bill Lee called the special session to consider a plan he said was urged by Donald Trump and that could break up Tennessee’s Democratic-held House district centered on Memphis. Republican lawmakers provided few details about the proposal as the chamber work started. In a response to the prospect of dividing Memphis’s congressional representation, Martin Luther King III sent a letter to Tennessee legislative leaders expressing “grave concern,” arguing that the change would undermine the work his father, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., helped secure when passage of the Voting Rights Act was fought for.
Tennessee Republicans also framed the effort in terms of the political calendar. The candidate qualifying period in Tennessee ended in March, and the primary election is scheduled for Aug. 6. Alabama and Louisiana both faced nearer deadlines tied to their own congressional primary schedules, and the Supreme Court’s decision last week added pressure to adjust timelines quickly where Republican leaders viewed it as legally possible.
South Carolina leaders said their redistricting push would begin with procedural requirements. The state House and Senate said the effort needs a two-thirds vote in each chamber, and they indicated the issue could come up as soon as Wednesday. Republican Speaker Murrell Smith said, “We don’t know if we have the votes in the House.” Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey warned that redistricting could backfire because of thin political margins, potentially producing a second Democrat in the U.S. House, and Massey said he spoke with Trump about the effort, with each side outlining their concerns. South Carolina’s primaries are scheduled for June 9, and early voting begins in three weeks.
In South Carolina, Rep. Jim Clyburn has represented the state’s 6th Congressional District since it was redrawn in 1992 to favor minority voters. He is running for an 18th term, a factor Republicans appear to be targeting as they seek changes to the seat under the post-ruling redistricting window.
Alabama, meanwhile, moved to put guardrails around any court-approved timeline changes. Legislative committees advanced a proposal Tuesday that would allow a special congressional primary if the Supreme Court clears a way for Alabama to change its House districts. The effort would follow Alabama’s request to the high court to set aside a judicial order that would require a map including two districts with substantial numbers of Black voters, and instead revert to a map passed in 2023 by Republicans. Alabama’s primaries are set for May 19, and the measure under consideration would ignore the results if the Supreme Court action arrives after or too close to that primary; lawmakers then would require a new primary scheduled by the governor under revised districts.
Republican state Rep. Chris Pringle, the bill’s sponsor, said, “This is an opportunity for the voters to vote in the districts drawn by legislators in 2023.” During a House committee hearing, several Black residents urged lawmakers not to alter the existing congressional districts. Eliza Jane Franklin, of rural Barbour County, said, “Representation matters — not just politically but in access, in power and in who gets to be heard.” Outside the statehouse, Democrats denounced the legislation as a Republican effort to seize power while invoking Alabama’s history of denying Black residents equal rights and representation; Democratic U.S. Rep. Terri Sewell told a crowd gathered outside the Alabama Statehouse that Republicans were “working to secure an electoral victory by taking Alabama back to the Jim Crow era, and we won’t go back.”
Louisiana’s delayed primary and already-sent ballots
In Louisiana, lawmakers planned new U.S. House districts after the Supreme Court last week struck down the state’s current map. The high court said Louisiana relied too heavily on race when creating a second Black-majority House district while seeking to comply with the Voting Rights Act, and it said the decision significantly altered a decades-old understanding of the law. Republicans in several states have cited that change as grounds to try to eliminate majority-Black districts that elected Democrats, a shift that civil rights advocates said could lessen congressional representation for Black Americans and other minorities.
After the Supreme Court’s decision, Republican Gov. Jeff Landry postponed Louisiana’s May 16 congressional primary. Landry said the pause would allow time for lawmakers to approve new House district lines. Louisiana’s Secretary of State reported that voters had already submitted more than 41,000 completed absentee ballots by last Thursday—about one-third of all absentee ballots sent out—according to the AP report. Democrats accounted for around 19,000 of those absentee ballots, Republicans around 17,000, and the remainder went to voters who did not register with either party.
Democrats and civil rights groups filed lawsuits challenging Louisiana’s suspension of the congressional primary. State Sen. Caleb Kleinpeter, a Republican, said a redistricting committee he leads planned to hold a public hearing Friday as the state worked through the post-ruling process.