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NASHVILLE, Tenn. — <\/span>Republican lawmakers in Tennessee are poised to take up a plan Thursday that could carve up a majority-Black congressional district, reshaping it to the GOP’s advantage as part of President Donald Trump’s strategy to try to hold on to a slim House majority in the November midterm elections.<\/p>\n The redistricting effort in Tennessee is one of several rapidly advancing plans in Southern states as Republicans try to leverage a U.S. Supreme Court ruling<\/a> that weakened the federal Voting Rights Act. <\/p>\n The court ruled that Louisiana relied too heavily on race<\/a> when creating a second Black-majority House district as it attempted to comply with the federal law. The high court’s decision altered a decades-old understanding of the law, giving Republicans grounds to try to eliminate majority-Black districts<\/a> that have elected Democrats. <\/p>\n Louisiana has postponed its congressional primary to give time for state lawmakers to craft a new House map. Legislation awaiting a final vote in Alabama also would upend the state\u2019s congressional primaries if courts allow the state to change its U.S. House districts. In South Carolina, meanwhile, Republican lawmakers urged on by Trump have taken initial steps to add congressional redistricting to their agenda. <\/p>\n The states are the latest to join an already fierce national redistricting battle<\/a>. Since Trump prodded Texas to redraw its U.S. House districts last year, eight states have adopted new congressional districts. From that, Republicans think they could gain as many as 13 seats while Democrats think they could gain up to 10. But some competitive races mean the parties may not get everything they sought in the November elections. <\/p>\n Protesters in Tennessee repeatedly interrupted legislative hearings Wednesday on the redistricting plans, yet Republicans advanced them for a potential final vote in the full House and Senate. <\/p>\n The package of bills would repeal a state law prohibiting mid-decade redistricting and reopen a candidate qualifying window for new people to enter the primary and existing candidates to switch districts. The proposed House map would break up Tennessee\u2019s lone Democratic-held district, centered on the majority-Black city of Memphis, creating a ripple effect of alterations to districts throughout the western and central parts of the state.<\/p>\n Republican House Speaker Cameron Sexton said the proposed districts were drawn based on population and politics, not racial data.<\/p>\n Democrats and civil rights activists denounced the efforts.<\/p>\n The proposal \u201cis Black vote dilution at an industrial scale,\u201d said Sekou Franklin, a political science professor at Middle Tennessee State University who is part of the Tennessee branch of the NAACP.<\/p>\n