Cleo Fields: “Absolutely. And for anyone to even think that a redistricting plan, and I do not care if it is congressional, I do not…”

“Absolutely. And for anyone to even think that a redistricting plan, and I do not care if it is congressional, I do not care if it is legislative or even a city council's plan or a school board plan, to think that politics does not play a role, a significant role in the drawing of these plans, is someone who is off base. You certainly cannot take the politics out of politics. When these plans were drawn in Louisiana, they were drawn based on incumbency protection, first; second, they were drawn based on the fact that Louisiana moved from eight congressional districts to seven. So, of course, districts were going to increase in size and not decrease in size. That is just a logical thing for them to do. They were also drawn based on commonality of interest. What people in north Louisiana have in common with people in south Louisiana, we have always had districts that connected urban and rural communities together. If we do not do that, we will not be able to live up to the deviation of zero deviation or one man-one vote requirement by the Constitution of the United States of America.”