2021’s Top Five Oddities Of America’s Broken Redistricting Process

The turn of the decade brings a uniquely American tradition, one that’s transformed over the years from tragedy to farce: redistricting. 


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1399027
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Just as I asked yesterday on the re-districting story:

Is it only legitimate reporting to tell the story from the ‘disaster the Dems are facing in midterms’ when other reporting indicates it’s not a disaster - that the Dems are not as much in the crisis stage as is being reported here?

I cited three stories yesterday from other sources that indicate just the opposite of the doom and gloom that TPM wants to focus on.

I’m all in favor of knocking down complacency, because the Dems DO need to win House and Senate next year, but what about the success stories? They won’t get enough clicks?

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I’m going to go with TMP is informing us, those of us who don’t follow this very important, but technical maneuvering.
Also it’s the end of the year what else do they have to report on?

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I understand your frustration. In addition, there are many stories which–by themselves–offer hope.

The only explanation (besides $$$$$$$) I can think of for Gloom and Doom stories anywhere is the torpor the Democrats exhibited in 2016, when every Democrat alive should have shelved their “dislike” for Hillary Clinton and voted for her to beat arch-criminal Donald Trump.

Complacency

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Heather Cox Richardson seems to find things to report on that aren’t regurgitations of stuff already examined.

December 27, 2021 - by Heather Cox Richardson (substack.com)

I think this might be something to talk about, no?

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So just checked the latest generic ballot at 538.
CW suggest that Dems need a 7 point advantage in the generic poll margin in order to beat the gerrymander headwind to win the House. Two polls by Yougov show 8% and 9% advantage for Dems.
Also too…I don’t think the important aspect of the 2020 census is the movement of folks from blue states to red states but more importantly, the movement of folks from red counties to blue cities.

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You ain’t from 'round here, are ya?

Takes on many meanings…curiosity…but also metaphorical and political.

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I’m not sure we’ve seen the final counts from the census, given that the numbers have been so terribly corrupted by the administration that was in charge of the census.

Has there been an actual final report on the 2020 census? Anyone?

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Census.gov

The only solution to gerrymandering is to abolish districts. All candidates for state legislatures and the House of Representatives run on statewide party slates, and the seats are assigned by proportional representation.

Yes, in a state like California this will result is several third party winners, but that is a good result in the long run.

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I’m just remembering how corrupted the data were, given that many refused to respond, many were afraid to respond and those that did may not have been truthful in their responses. I’m remembering stories of door to door workers that were threatened. And then there are these:

The census, corrupted (timesunion.com)

Census takers say they were told to enter false information | AP News

Flaws in Census Count Imperil Trump Plan to Exclude Undocumented Immigrants - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Census Bureau Finds Irregularities That May Affect Millions Of Records : NPR

Political Interference in the 2020 Census - American Oversight

I just don’t know how anyone takes this seriously, but it’s all we’ve got.

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The problem here is that blue voters congregate in cities. That makes it easy for the districting process to pack them in a few very blue districts (think Houston and Austin) and to crack the suburban areas so that they are safely red.

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The Elephant in the room (to me) is the fact that any rational person would vote for a party bent on destroying our Democracy.

I understand I will get a host of negative reactions for this, but what the GOP is planning–in plain sight–is the equivalent of an invading military force establishing a completely new order.

  • without arms

  • desired by enough Americans to pull it off

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I think they were just listing some of the more outlandish. Not as total “gloom and doom” but more “look at what these yahoos are out there doing.” YMMV

After careful study, we’ve collected some of our favorite examples of this year’s redistricting nonsense.

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As usual, they can’t win honestly, so they cheat.

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The trouble is what happens when a word like “gerrymander” enters most conversations: glazed eyes and phone-checking. And yet it’s gonna lose us a democracy.

Bingo! Then the big confusing ballot of dozens of offices might be replaced by a more modest set of choices, the first being “Political Party.” Yeah, a lot of the demented geezers still talk about how they “vote for the man, not the party”, but most people recognize that the “man” no longer counts; it’s ALL “party” now. Particularly for Republicans.

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Too true. However, the NM Legislature, taking a plan from citizen redistricting groups, actually split Albuquerque in half, into CDs 1 and 2. Another plan might have had Albuquerque in all three, but didn’t make it through the Lege.

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The new CD map here in NM, already signed into law, makes all three CD’s more competitive in order to change the southern 2nd CD, often called “Little Texas” for its oil-patch dependence, from a slightly RRR to a slightly more than slightly D composition. Let’s hope it works. The current occupant, Herrell, is helping out by amping up her Turnipism, which will repel the urban D voters of Las Cruces, as well as the south valley of Burque voters that, as noted by zandru above, were also shivved off from the 1st into the 2nd. Meanwhile the fairly reliable RRR town of Roswell was moved to my CD, the 3rd, which now stretches across the north and most of the way down the east side of the state to suck up a share of the Little Texas morons. I’m gonna be making more donations to Teresa Leger Fernandez’s campaign now that she has a tougher row to hoe.

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Some great news today is that the OH Supreme Court has been dunking on the GOP defendants in the redistricting case this morning. From the swing vote, Justice O’Connor, "Justice O’Connor: “just because the proposed map has more competitive districts than the 2011 map doesn’t say anything, the previous map was gerrymandered and that’s what voters wanted to not have.”

Among the more egregious aspects of the OH GOP plan is it carved up metro Cincy into 3 districts and made them all GOP even though Biden carried the region by a clear margin.

The current 12-4 GOP delegation in OH could end up 9-6 or 10-5 GOP (OH is losing a district). That would be a NET GAIN to Dems in a red state of +3 to +5 seats. That would pretty much offset any gains the GOP has from FL/GA and leave the Dems with some real net gains from blue states and a much better map than the one they’ve been running on for the past 6 election cycles.

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