Tuesday saw the least surprising thing in the history of things. Just a few days after Louisiana’s legislature passed a congressional map hand-made for him to get elected, Cleo Fields – who was chairman of the Senate and Governmental Affairs Committee through which that map traveled as it made its way to Gov. Landry’s desk – jumped into the race for the newly-redrawn Sixth District seat.

Don't you dare say you're surprised. pic.twitter.com/eSljX4mIrs

— Scott McKay (@TheHayride) January 23, 2024

The last time Louisiana had a second majority-black district, and like now, that district was a stringy, Rorshach test-looking thing, Fields was the congressman representing it.

That district, which was the 8th Congressional District back then, ended up going away after a lawsuit was filed on the basis that it was an unconstitutionally racially-gerrymandered thing.

Almost everybody we talk to thinks that’s going to happen again. In fact, what we expect is that by the end of the month there will be a host of plaintiffs running into court seeking redress.

And if that happens, the chances aren’t bad that the new litigation won’t be disposed of in time to conduct the 2024 congressional elections in Louisiana off this new map. Which would mean that the current map, the one Louisiana’s six congressional representatives were elected according to, would govern this fall’s races.

And that’s not a result any of them would be unhappy with.

Nor is it a result that would make the vast majority of Louisiana’s legislature unhappy.

Nor would anybody in the governor’s office or attorney general’s office be all that bummed out about.

Cleo Fields wouldn’t be so happy, though.

There isn’t much more we can say about this at this point. We can help but think the fight over Louisiana’s congressional districts is only beginning and was definitely not resolved by the passage of the map Fields thinks he’ll benefit from.

We also can’t help but think it’s by design.