Capitol Hill Blue Forums Political Issues Politics In General Gerrymandering

I think gerrymandering is probably the most destructive, anti-democratic activity carried on by parties. But, it has company.

I think the main reason independents vote against the Party of the President in the first midterm election, is that the new President has actually done some things their opposition can complain about. The complaints are not necessary valid, but there is some truth in the complaints in that they usually are about some things the new President has done. Independents have no political positions, so they don't really think about those things being good or bad. Somebody in a suit on TV is complaining about them, so that's all the input they need!

Right back to the founding fathers, they worried about an uneducated mob following demagogues down the garden path. Most of the Independents ARE that mob. A bunch of poorly-informed, easily-manipulated people determining who will run the country. Tea-partiers complained about "the elite", but "elite" in this case actually means people who are educated and have some awareness of the consequences of idiots running everything.

Trump said: "I love the uneducated," for a reason.

Two things, Gerrymandering is said to be Congressmen choosing their voters instead of the voters choosing their congressmen.

The Democrats rode that uneducated train for a long time. From 1980-2012 not a H.S. graduate voted Democratic in presidential races. College grads went Republican from 1988-2004, 2008 for Obama, 2012 for Romney and in 2016 for Hillary.

https://www.nytimes.com/elections/2008/results/president/national-exit-polls.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_United_States_presidential_election#Voter_demographics

https://www.cnn.com/election/2016/results/exit-polls

There's a lot more info in the links that may or may not interest you.

For someone who follows numbers, history etc. It's easy to spot these. If just the educated voted, G.H.W. Bush would have won reelection in 1992 and Dole would have become president in 1996. G.W. Bush won college grads twice, Obama in 2008. But the educated would have put Romney in as president in 2012. Now come to think about it. Romney would have been the GOP candidate in 2016, no Trump. So perhaps the educated knew exactly what they were doing and who they were voting for.

Now why independents vote the way they do, I really don't know. It's all speculation. I only know what history shows. I find independents fascinating, Republicans and democrats, boring and dull.

I'll add this, every individual has their reasons for voting the way they do. Those reasons are important to them. Although many may think their reasons are asinine.

Where Redistricting Stands in 14 States (NYT, Subscription) Because this is a subscription source, I will give the highlights:


Colorado +1D Net 1 D
Democrats may gain one seat

Georgia +1R Net 0
Republicans may gain one seat

Illinois +1D; -2R Net 3 D
Democrats may gain one seat; Republicans may lose two

Indiana
Republicans may protect one competitive seat

Iowa (EVEN)
Democrats may gain one seat ("But the Republican-led state legislature may reject the map because it would give Democrats — who hold one of Iowa’s four House seats — a good chance of winning two seats. (That said, it would also effectively cap Democrats at two seats, preventing them from holding three as they did in 2019 and 2020.)")

Maryland +1D Net 4 D
Democrats may gain one seat. Or Republicans might (but probably not).

Missouri (EVEN)
Republicans may protect one competitive seat

Nebraska (EVEN)
Republicans may protect one competitive seat (Tied to that, may make the split that occurred in the Electoral College unlikely)

New Hampshire +1R Net 3 D
Republicans may gain one seat

New Mexico +1D Net 4 D
Democrats may gain one seat

New York +4/5 D Net 8 D
Democrats may gain four or five seats

Oregon (EVEN)
It’s wide open

South Carolina (EVEN)
Republicans may protect one competitive seat

Tennessee +1 R Net 7 D
Republicans may gain one seat

Now, it's early days, and some aggressive States (Texas, Wisconsin, South Carolina) have not weighed in. The end result, however, may not be as dire as often predicted. Red seats will become redder, and blue seats will become rarer.

Iowa Republicans face dilemma after commission scrambles congressional map (Politico).

"Iowa finally has a proposed congressional map — now Republicans in Des Moines just have to decide if they can tolerate it.

Nonpartisan state legislative staffers unveiled their first stab at redrawing the political boundaries with a draft that upended the political slant of key districts and lumped some state legislators into new seats together.

GOP legislators huddled on Thursday as the proposal was released but have yet to give an indication of whether or not they will vote to adopt it or send the commission back to the drawing board.

"I'm going to study it. I'm going to see what I and my colleagues think is best for the state as a collective whole," said state Rep. Bobby Kaufmann, who chairs the state government committee. "And then we'll make a decision in the next couple of weeks about whether to do a yes vote, or roll the dice and say no and see what map two brings."

Their choice could have huge implications for the battle for control of Congress. Back in D.C., Republicans privately griped that it left them worse off in their quest to reclaim the House. But legislators are still analyzing the state legislative maps, and they must reject or approve them all in union in a process that the state holds up as a "gold standard" for nonpartisan redistricting."

There may be up to a million more Covid deaths to come, if most of the vaccine resistors chose to get the virus instead of vaccinations. We are already seeing reports that a lot more Republicans are dying than Democrats. Redistricting is going to be based on census data that does not take that into account. So there is a chance that gerrymandered 55% safe districts may not be safe after all. Gerrymandering depends on a static political divide, to group one Party's voters into as many slightly "safe" districts as possible. But if the politics of a district's voters is changing, that district may flip to the other side. Then most of your "safe" districts may shift Party's.

Parties used to try to preserve some "really safe" enclaves, like 60% of the vote or more, just to keep their leaders in the House. It would be really embarrassing if the Speaker of the House lost his seat. (But he or she could still be elected as Speaker!)

Sometimes I think this gerrymandering thing too hyped up. As Pondering pointed out, districts change over time. Prime example is GA 6th district. It’s just north of Atlanta. In 2012 and 14, R Price was winning the district with 60-65% of the vote. Then folks from Atlanta flooded into the district which in 2018 D McBath won a close one only to win in 2020 55-45. The 6th went from solid Republican to solid democrat in that short time span. Folks moving in, moving out, dying, new voters being added, changed the dynamics immensely.

It seems gerrymandering has a huge impact for the first couple of elections, then it becomes a crap shoot for the final 3. What makes the difference here in Georgia is the court ordered majority minority districts. It meant the democrats would have 5 congress members before any vote took place, all black. The rest was all white GOP until the 6th changed hands in 2018 giving the democrats 6 vs. 8 for the GOP.

At last count there were 22 majority black districts where blacks made up 51% or more of the population, 30 majority Hispanic districts, 2 majority Asian districts. Which means the Democrats are almost guaranteed 50 seats prior to any house election. But this also dilutes the democratic strength in the remaining 385 districts giving the GOP a much better chance of winning in those. For the Record, all 22 majority black districts are represented by black democrats, 25 of the 30 Hispanic districts by democrats with 5 Republican Hispanics and both Asian districts are democratic.

So does these court ordered majority minority districts give the Democrats a huge advantage in that it basically guarantees them 50 seats before any congressional election takes place or is that guarantee offset by the chances the Republicans have in winning in the remaining 385 since these 50 districts are over stacked with Democratic voters? I’ve always wondered about that. I even started doing a paper on it a couple of times before I let it go by the wayside. So, what do you think?

Federal court says Wisconsin redistricting case can proceed (The Hill).

"A federal court panel on Thursday denied a request from Wisconsin Republicans to dismiss a lawsuit over the state's voting maps, keeping alive a legal challenge brought by Democratic allies and voting rights advocates.

In its ruling, the three-judge panel also granted a request from Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers (D) and the state's five GOP U.S. congressmen to intervene in the partisan court clash over the once-per-decade redistricting process, which involves drawing new legislative and congressional districts.
....
Wisconsin's political maps are among the most gerrymandered in the country, according to experts. Republicans in recent years have won just around half the vote for legislative seats statewide but nearly two-thirds of the districts themselves; they hold 61 of 99 seats in the state Assembly after winning 54 percent of the popular vote."

It's interesting, you two have addressed the two most common techniques in "cracking and stacking". It's true that demographic changes can alter efforts at cracking, if the margins are narrow enough, but stacking is rarely so undermined. Stacking is also at least facially, consonant with "majority-minority" districting. It's actually a fairly conflicted process. As noted, the very process of stacking/majority-minority districting can result in diluting minority interests in other Districts.

Have either of you read Charles Blow's book, The Devil You Know? He proposes that blacks move back to the South to improve the chances of minority representation in the Senate (and other offices), since minorities already represent near majorities all over the south.

The GOP’s Young Stars Don’t Want to Represent Trump’s Party

The decision of Rep. Anthony Gonzalez (R-OH) to not seek reelection, in main part because of attacks by twice-impeached, unre-elected former POTUS Trump have made the Ohio Republican fear for the safety of his family, could open the gates to more Republican incumbents choosing to step aside making GOP plans to take over the House more difficult than they had planned on.

The candidates that Trump is backing are not winning elections - even with gerrymandering.

The Trump Phenomena