BATON ROUGE - Legislators in the Senate & Governmental Affairs Committee will hold their second hearing to decide on new congressional maps. 

Senators met for the first time Friday, when three maps were proposed by State Sen. Jay Morris, R-Monroe, and one map was proposed by State Sen. Ed Price, D-Gonzales. 

Price's map contains two majority Black districts. Two of Morris' maps decrease the number of majority Black districts from two to one. The other has zero majority-black districts. 

Friday's meeting turned fiery when State Sen. Gary Carter Jr., D-New Orleans, alleged that Morris' maps were racist. 

"He suggests that he's not racist. I suggest we take a look at his work," Carter said.

On Monday, Carter apologized to Morris. 

"My questions seem like personal ad hominem, personal attacks on you. I apologize, I did not intend that at all. That's part of me losing my temper during the course of the hearing," Carter said. 

Carter stepped down from the committee and was replaced by State Sen. Royce Duplessis, D-New Orleans, on Tuesday.

Carter wasn't the only one speaking to his fellow legislators about what happened Friday. Morris took to the Senate floor to accept Carter's apology and ask for one himself. Morris said he was misquoted by Democratic party leaders, who said he told Louisiana Democratic Party Executive Director Dadrius Lanus to "shut up, boy," as Morris walked by him. 

"If I said those things, I would get down on my knees right now and beg for your forgiveness, but I did not say them," Morris said, adding that he's gotten more than 150 death threats since the allegations were made. 

In a review of WBRZ's footage from Friday, the word "boy" was not heard during the encounter between Morris and Lanus. 

Lanus said that while he believes the death threats are uncalled for, the senator can cry him a river. 

"The audio was clear. There were eyeball witnesses that saw and heard what he said," Lanus told WBRZ. 

Following that meeting, security at the Capitol has been increased, and occupancy restrictions have been enforced for the meeting room and the hallway outside of it. 

Legislators are scrambling to pass new maps following the Supreme Court's decision that Louisiana's congressional maps were unconstitutional and racially gerrymandered. The court suspended the customary 32-day waiting period for an opinion to become official and denied a petition for a recall of the judgment, making its decision final. 

Governor Jeff Landry issued an executive order to suspend voting for the U.S. House primaries, which happened after mail-in ballots had already been cast and two days before early voting. 

Early voters in Louisiana have been told that their votes for the U.S. House do not count, but all of the other races on the ballot are still going as scheduled. 

U.S. Rep. Cleo Fields and 10 U.S. House candidates have joined a lawsuit filed by community activist Eugene Collins and U.S. House candidate Lindsay Garcia. It's one of five lawsuits that have been filed since the ruling. They argue that the race should not have been suspended, as voting had already started. 

Despite the confusion, East Baton Rouge Parish had the highest early voting turnout in the state, with more than 294,000 voters casting ballots ahead of election day on May 16. 

Once the committee approves a map, it will be sent to the Senate floor for a vote. The map would then pass through the same process in the House of Representatives. If legislators in the House approve it as-is, it will go to the governor's desk.