Release from the Laywers’ Committee via email:

Last night, a federal appeals court ordered Mississippi officials to redraw district lines for a state senate district in the Mississippi Delta, leaving undisturbed the finding by federal district judge Carlton Reeves that the boundaries diluted the African American vote in violation of Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.  The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals denied a request from state officials to conduct this fall’s election under the existing district lines and instead held that the legislature should draw new lines for State Senate District 22 to comply with the Act or allow the election to be held under an alternative plan adopted by Judge Reeves.

Court 2-1 order: