Federal judges hear arguments from NAACP, state officials over new legislative districts

Associated Press

09-04-2025

A federal three-judge panel on Tuesday did not indicate whether it would accept the Mississippi Legislature's plan to redraw 15 legislative districts or demand that candidates run under a different map in a November special election.
Attorneys for the NAACP and state officials appeared in federal court in Jackson to argue whether the Legislature's proposed maps satisfy a previous court order that determined state officials diluted Black voting strength when they redrew the state's 174 legislative districts in 2022.
Two U.S. district judges, Daniel Jordan III and Sul Ozerden, and one U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals judge, Leslie Southwick, ordered the state to create new legislative maps that redraw a House district around the Chickasaw County area, a Senate district in DeSoto County and a Senate district in the Hattiesburg area.
The Legislature proposed a new Senate map that creates one new majority-Black district each in DeSoto County and the Hattiesburg area, with no incumbent senator in either district. To account for the new districts, two pairs of incumbents were placed in other districts.
The Legislature also proposed a new House map that tweaked five districts in north Mississippi and made the House district in Chickasaw County a majority-Black district.
'The Legislature chose to draw plans in an effort to satisfy the court's order,' said Tommie Cardin, an attorney representing the state.
The NAACP and Black voters from around the state are the plaintiffs in the case. They did not object to the Hattiesburg-area Senate districts, but they do object to the proposal in the DeSoto County Senate district and the Chickasaw County House district.
Ari Savitzky, an attorney for the plaintiffs, told the judges that the DeSoto and Chickasaw districts, on paper, may contain a majority of Black citizens eligible to vote. However, he said they still do not allow Black voters a realistic shot at electing candidates of their choice.
'The legislative plans add numerically Black-majority districts, but the opportunities they create are illusory,' Savitzky said.
State officials are the defendants in the suit, and contend that federal law does not require them to create a district that gives Black voters a realistic chance of success. It simply requires them to make one that is competitive.
'This is not a beauty contest among plans where the court determines which plan is more superior to the other,' Cardin said.
Rep. Jon Lancaster, a Republican from Houston, currently represents the central House district in question. Savitzsky said that because an incumbent represents that district, it would be difficult for a Black-preferred candidate to win against him in a special election.
Judge Southwick pushed back on that argument, saying that incumbency seems more specific to the 'politics of the moment,' instead of a broader legal argument.
'I'm not sure there's precedential authority to show it isn't a good district,' Southwick said.
The panel, however, asked the attorneys of both parties about the DeSoto County Senate district. This part of the proposal has met objections from both the plaintiffs and local officials in DeSoto County, though for different reasons.
Judge Jordan and Judge Southwick pressed attorneys on whether it was enough for the new majority-Black districts to have a simple majority of eligible Black voters, or if the districts should contain an 'effective majority' to satisfy federal law.
Savitzky argued that in the DeSoto-area districts where a white candidate is running in a white-majority district, the white candidate is predicted to win almost every time. But when a Black candidate runs in the majority-Black district proposed by the Legislature, it's simply a 'coin flip' whether the Black candidate will win.
Cardin, however, argued federal law only requires the state's remedial maps to create a 'real opportunity' for Black voters to elect their preferred candidate, not a 'guarantee of success.'
The panel did not issue a ruling from the bench, nor did it give a specific timeframe for when it would issue a ruling. However, Judge Southwick said the panel would hand down a ruling as 'quickly as we can.'
An attorney for the state stressed that state and local elections officials must have a resolution by the end of the month to process absentee ballot applications from military members serving overseas.
If the federal judges accept the Legislature's maps, the qualifying period for new elections would run from May 19 to May 30. The primary election would be held on August 5, with a potential primary runoff on September 2 and the general election on November 4.