Florida was supposed to be the finale of this year’s race to the bottom on redistricting. Yet a cacophonous encore is now playing across the South after a Supreme Court ruling last week.

The GOP started it in Texas last summer. A back-and-forth ensued, with Democrats redrawing maps in California and Virginia while Republicans did so in Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio.

Simultaneously, a long-running constitutional dispute over the Voting Rights Act came to a head last week when the high court limited the consideration of race while designing districts in Louisiana v. Callais.

The court’s ruling wasn’t about partisan gerrymandering, per se. It was about when states could be compelled to draw majority-minority districts under the VRA and the Constitution. In practice, those districts tend to be Democratic.

The decision lifts Louisiana’s need to have two majority-Black districts. But Gov. Jeff Landry (R) seems intent on maximizing his party’s gain from the decision, potentially with a map that picks up both of those seats for the GOP.

Making such changes so close to an election — primary ballots have already been printed — creates confusion. The Supreme Court announcing the VRA decision closer to the end of its term next month could have avoided this 11th-hour frenzy.

For prudential reasons, other states might have opted to hold off until 2028. Yet Tennessee’s legislature met on Tuesday to eliminate its only blue district, based in Memphis. Alabama Republicans, too, are forging ahead with plans to knock out at least one of two Democratic seats, even though the state is under court order to use its current map until 2030. Mississippi lawmakers will meet to debate redistricting later this month.

Not everyone is jumping on the bandwagon. South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster (R) backed off plans for a special session. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) shot down redistricting before he leaves office at the end of the year.

Traditionally, states completed redistricting only once a decade, after the decennial census required by the Constitution. The process was still political, but it was a sensible norm that society took for granted. It helped create certainty for voters and spurred competition because politicians couldn’t predict how places or groups would shift over 10 years.

The most obvious way to stop this spiral from repeating itself every election cycle is for Congress to pass a law requiring states to only do redistricting after a census. As improbable as that seems, it’s more likely than either party unilaterally disarming.