Fields: Vote the entire ballot even though Gov. Landry has suspended U.S House elections

Published: May 5, 2026

By: Kylah Babin and Sheridan White, LSU Manship School News Service

BATON ROUGE – U.S. Rep. Cleo Fields told the Baton Rouge Press Club Monday that Louisiana voters should vote as normal in elections for the U.S. House of Representatives even though Gov. Jeff Landry suspended voting in those races in the wake of a recent Supreme Court ruling that the state’s congressional districts were unconstitutional due to racial gerrymandering.

“At the end of the day, the Supreme Court did not say, ‘Halt the election,’ nor should it, and we’re going to let the Supreme Court make a decision fairly soon about whether or not Louisiana can do what it did,” Fields said. “That’s why I’m urging voters to actually go out and cast their votes for the whole ticket.”

Fields, a Baton Rouge Democrat, represents the snake-like congressional 6th District that was created by the Legislature in 2024 to give Louisiana a second majority-Black district. It was that district that drew most of the Supreme Court’s attention in its 6-3 vote on April 29 that ordered the state to once again redraw its congressional maps.

After Landry suspended the U.S. House primary elections based on the court’s ruling, Fields joined several other candidates in filing a federal lawsuit challenging the decision to suspend the congressional primary elections after voting had already begun. Election day is May 16, but absentee and early voting has already begun using the original ballot.

Fields and the other plaintiffs said suspending the elections mid-cycle violates the First, Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, particularly after some voters had already begun casting ballots.