Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) has called on the Tennessee General Assembly to reconvene and redraw the state’s congressional districts to create a 9-0 Republican map. The proposal comes on the heels of a blockbuster Supreme Court ruling centered on districts drawn on the basis of race.
Tennessee has nine congressional districts. Republicans currently hold eight seats, while Democrat Steve Cohen represents the 9th District, which is based in Memphis and covers Shelby County.
The existing map was drawn by the Republican-controlled legislature after the 2020 census and approved in 2022. That map split the Democratic-leaning city of Nashville across three districts, contributing to Republican gains in areas that had previously supported Democrats.
In an X post Wednesday, Blackburn called on the GOP-controlled legislature to draw a 9-0 map by targeting Cohen’s district. “I urge our state legislature to reconvene to redistrict another Republican seat in Memphis. It’s essential to cement [President Trump’s] agenda and the Golden Age of America.”
She then attached a map showing all nine of Tennessee’s House districts colored red. “I’ve vowed to keep Tennessee a red state, and as Governor, I’ll do everything I can to make this map a reality,” Blackburn, who announced her gubernatorial campaign last year, added.
Blackburn’s proposal follows Wednesday’s Supreme Court ruling on Louisiana’s congressional map drawn under Senate Bill 8. That map included a second majority-Black district in response to prior Voting Rights Act (VRA) Section 2 findings of vote dilution.
A federal district court had ruled the map an unconstitutional racial gerrymander, finding that race predominated in its drawing without sufficient justification.
On Wednesday, the high court held that because Section 2 of the VRA did not require Louisiana to create an additional majority-minority district, no compelling governmental interest justified the predominant use of race in drawing the district. The map therefore violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
The ruling did not fully invalidate Section 2 of the VRA but significantly limited its application in redistricting. It emphasized that states cannot use race as the predominant factor in drawing districts unless strictly necessary to comply with the VRA and that such compliance must meet strict scrutiny.
