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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #250 on: September 12, 2014, 10:19:58 AM »

Ohio

What is left of Ohio when we chop off the industrial shore is, unsurprisingly, a safely Republican State. This more rural and somewhat southern-influenced State is our newest addition to the already large "never voted Democrat except in 1964" club. Demographically, it is the biggest of the two, and its population decline hasn't been as catastrophic as Erie's (though still quite pronounced).

OH Presidential election results, 1960-2012:


There is not much to say about OH's political evolution, since (in net terms) the State can hardly be said to have "evolved" at all. Essentially, this state appears like a mirror image of Erie, having a Republican advantage comparable to the latter's Democratic advantage. This advantage never really reaches stronghold levels (good years have the GOP around +15) but also never really becomes competitive (around R+8 at its lowest). The only possibly significant shift might be an increase in Republican strength in the 1980s, which has more or less held until now.

However, county map comparisons across time (below you can see 1976 and 2012, both of which saw GOP wins of similar magnitudes) reveal that Ohio's internal geography has shifted somewhat.



The story of this geographic shift is one with which we are becoming quite familiar: rural areas (some historically favorable to Democrats, like southeastern Appalachian Ohio, as well as some already GOP leaning ones in the western part of the State) trending decisively toward the GOP, while urban cores (in this case, Columbus' Franklin County, Cincinnati's Hamilton County, and Athens' eponymous county) become increasingly dominated by Democrats. It's quite interesting that, in this particular case, the two trends have roughly canceled out each other, while in so many other States the cities (like in PA) or the country (like in TX) have clearly won the battle.

Capital: Columbus still fits perfectly.

Governor: John Kasich crushed Ted Strickland in this part of the State in 2010, and is probably headed to a landslide reelection.

Senators: Mike DeWine (class 1) and Rob Portman (class 3) - once again, courtesy to Dubya for these picks. Wink

Representatives: Once again thanks to Muon, we now know that Republicans, with their obvious supermajorities in the State Legislature, would be able to craft the perfect gerrymander and get a 10R-0D map (with every district having a PVI above R+9 in 2008).
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Gass3268
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« Reply #251 on: September 12, 2014, 10:36:34 AM »

It would be interesting to see what happens here in the future if Columbus continues to grow at their currently pace (+4.51 for the city, +3.42% for the metro area). Obama actually saw a pretty good swing in the Columbus area in 2012. Then again its doubtful he would have campaigned there if the states were divided like this.
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #252 on: September 12, 2014, 02:27:42 PM »

Population growth and a 2012-style Dem trend in Columbus would definitely not be sufficient to make Ohio competitive in the foreseeable future, though. It would take a massive shift in its suburbs (which, so far, have remained overwhelmingly Republican) to make a difference at the State level. And even then, it would probably need to be supplemented by other areas like the Cincinnati metro. I don't see that happening, sadly. Wink
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #253 on: September 19, 2014, 12:39:09 PM »

Sorry, it's been a busy week with all these elections, and I got the flu yesterday, so I didn't have time to come up with a full State update. I will try to post Indiana in a couple days (though I must warn you that it's pretty boring).

In the meantime, here's the Erie / Ohio PVI comparison chart:

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Enderman
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« Reply #254 on: September 19, 2014, 11:46:58 PM »

We'll it's been an entire year since my second bump (in December it will be two years) so far I think that with about five pages of updates, this is one of my favorite threads on the forum. Keep up the good work Antonio! Smiley
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #255 on: September 20, 2014, 07:23:48 AM »

We'll it's been an entire year since my second bump (in December it will be two years) so far I think that with about five pages of updates, this is one of my favorite threads on the forum. Keep up the good work Antonio! Smiley

Well, in this year there have been 10 months of complete oblivion. Tongue I really can't believe it took me 4 damn years to restart this thing!

Still, I'm also pretty happy with the result! I really appreciate all the compliments and appreciation this thread has received. Smiley This seems to be one of the few things I've ever done on the forum that has attracted a significant following, so I really need to prioritize it.
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« Reply #256 on: September 20, 2014, 11:38:55 AM »

Excellent work here, Antonio.
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
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« Reply #257 on: September 22, 2014, 01:32:03 PM »
« Edited: September 22, 2014, 01:35:57 PM by Antonio V »

Indiana

I have taken away Indiana's northwestern corner, the area around Gary (which, as JCL angrily pointed out, gave it access to Lake Michigan) due to its connection with Chicagoland. As you can imagine, removing one of the few Democratic bases of support in an already solid-GOP State didn't exactly stimulate competitiveness. And so, our "never voted Democrat except in 1964" club grows even bigger.

IN Presidential election results, 1960-2012:


Unsurprisingly, Obama's historic win in 2008 does not survive this amputation, as McCain instead even managed to crack 50%. Otherwise, the pattern is pretty much the same as IRL: that of a consistently Republican State which Democrats can only hope to capture in LBJesque landslides. Over the observed time span, this new Indiana is consistently 2 to 4 points more Republican than its OTL counterpart:



The result is that only twice (1984 and the still impressive 2008) the Democrats managed to come within 10 points of the national margin. The State's movements remain roughly the same, with a slight Democratic uptick in the 1970s followed by a massive Republican shift from 1984 to 2004 (that shift is a bit more pronounced in the new State than IRL, indicating that the Gary area began to diverge even more strongly from the rest of the State). Overall, any Democratic candidate would say "meh, nothing to see there" and not even bother campaigning there.

Capital: Still Indianapolis

Governor: Still Mike Pence

Senators: Joe Donnelly (class 1) and Dan Coats (class 3) - Donnelly still won, though by a mere 2 points.

Representatives: Indiana would lose a Representative, and it would obviously be the Gary-based one held by a Democrat. The State government wouldn't change much, since Republicans already have full control of the Legislature. Interestingly though, the actual Indiana map doesn't look much gerrymandered - with a nice square-looking Democratic seat around Indianapolis. I would assume they keep this arrangement and thus create a 7R-1D delegation.
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #258 on: September 22, 2014, 03:50:03 PM »

Chicago and Illinois are next! They're gonna be a lot more interesting. Cheesy
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #259 on: September 27, 2014, 03:15:24 PM »
« Edited: September 27, 2014, 03:20:56 PM by Antonio V »

Chicago

The other City-State of this scenario, Chicago encompasses the eponymous city's entire metropolitan area (that is, the Chicago-Naperville CSA as defined by the Census Bureau). This means it is mostly carved out of Illinois' Northeastern corner, but also takes a few counties away from Indiana (as we have seen) and Wisconsin's Kenosha County. The resulting State has about as many inhabitants as Georgia, and more than twice as many as those that are left in Illinois. Thus, despite its name, this State can't be reduced to its core city, as it include a large ring of populous suburbs whose political leanings have been somewhat different.

CH Presidential election results, 1960-2012:


Unsurprisingly, modern Chicago is utterly dominated by Democrats, giving Obama over two-thirds of its votes in 2008. Since 1992, no Republican has come even somewhat close to winning it. However, while a Democratic preference can be found as far back as 1960 (where Richard Daley no doubt helped Kennedy distance Nixon by 7 points), it was nowhere near as lopsided as it is these days. Nixon and Reagan both carried CH easily in their landslide reelections, and several times in those decades, the State's vote was very hotly contested. In 1976, Carter squeaked in by a trivial 0.05 points margin; four years later, Reagan beat him by 0.94 points; and in 1988, Bush edged Dukakis by 0.21 points.

Clearly, there was a time when Republicans had a sizable constituency in Chicago State. And as you can imagine, this base was located in the city's suburbs and exurbs. While Cook County's demographic weigh tended to win the State for Democrats, if Republicans managed to keep the margin there close enough, they could rack up the votes in the suburbs and stand a chance to sweep the State. Their most recent presidential win, in 1988, illustrates this strategy pretty well:



Although 2 of the State's 3.2 million votes were cast in Cook County, which Dukakis carried by 12 points, Republicans managed to make up for that loss with their massive success in the outer rings of the metropolitan area. They took more than 60% (and sometimes more than 70%) in 9 of the State's 16 counties, including the populous DuPage, Kane, and Lake (OTL IL) counties. Even though Dukakis actually won two other counties (OTL IN's Lake County and Kenosha County) he still failed to carry what clearly is a must-win State for the Democrats. What happened since 1992 is that Democrats brought their Cook County edge up to 11 (or rather, up to about 50 points) while making the suburbs actually competitive (with Obama winning all but 2 counties in 2008). Thus, just like New York, Chicago provides a striking illustration of the rise of Democratic dominance in large metropolitan areas over the past 3 decades.

Capital: I'll let you guess this one. Tongue

Governor: Pat Quinn was reelected by a narrow but decisive margin in 2010, and he's probably favored for reelection this year.

Senators: Bobby Rush (class 1) and Lisa Madigan (class 2)

Representatives: Obviously Democrats control the State Legislature, and would thus be able to mess around with the districts map as they please. How far could they reach while complying with VRA? I'm not really sure. My guess would be a 12D-2R map, with two Republicans being packed in safer versions of IL-6 and IL-14. That would definitely require some balls, though. Tongue
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Gass3268
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« Reply #260 on: September 27, 2014, 04:29:12 PM »
« Edited: September 27, 2014, 04:35:31 PM by Gass3268 »


Capital: I'll let you guess this one. Tongue


Kenosha?



Aurora?



Gary?

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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #261 on: September 28, 2014, 03:51:48 AM »

Yeah... no. Wink
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RR1997
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« Reply #262 on: October 05, 2014, 09:15:48 AM »

This is one of the greatest threads ever
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« Reply #263 on: October 05, 2014, 02:41:33 PM »

I'd say Aurora would at least have a shot if you wanted someplace that wasn't crowded (politicians hate traffic, after all Wink )  But eh, not surprising, yet interesting cause I have a vested interest nonetheless Wink  Though personally I'd prefer Lisa Madigan as governor, as while I like Quinn, he does some boneheaded things at alarming regularity...  I'm not in Chicago though so I'll be busy being quashed under Brady's heel no doubt Tongue
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Princess Nyan Cat
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« Reply #264 on: October 05, 2014, 07:30:26 PM »

I used to live in McHenry and Kane Counties, but this state formed around Chicago would be about the most horrible place I could imagine. The taxation and corruption alone would be staggering.
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
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« Reply #265 on: October 10, 2014, 11:07:16 AM »

Sorry for the long absence! I'm getting really busy these days. Anyway, while I have some time, let's move on to...


Illinois

What would Illinois look like without Chicagoland? Certainly nothing like the image that we tend to have this State IRL. The level of demographic, economic, political and cultural hegemony that Chicago exerts over downstate IL rivals that of NYC over upstate NY. We can pretty sure that our Illinoisans would welcome this split as a liberation. In a nutshell, the new Illinois is a sparsely populated (ranking just below Kentucky) but relatively vast State. It remains quite diverse, with several mid-sized cities like Springfield, Peoria or Champaign, and both major industrial and rural areas (including regions that would fit well in the South). How would such a State have voted throughout the past half-century?

IL Presidential election results, 1960-2012:


To no one's surprise, Illinois has historically tended to favor Republicans, at least at the Presidential level. It only rarely went Democratic, and generally in exceptional circumstances like LBJ's landslide or Obama's favorite-son effect in 2008 (would it have crossed Chicago's borders in such a scenario? this remains unclear). Clinton seems to be the only Democrat to have done genuinely well in the State, sweeping it by 10 points in 1992. The contrast with Obama, who only narrowly carried IL in 2008 and was severely distanced by Romney four years later, is quite striking. On the whole, Democrats seem to be on the decline when compared to their performances in the 1990s - although if you look at the bigger picture, Democrats were already doing pretty bad in Kennedy's days. It's also interesting to note that, since 1984, Illinois has displayed an uncanny similarity with Missouri in its voting patterns. Over this period, the two States' margins differed by no more than 2 points in every election except 2008. Thus, just like Missouri, Illinois seems to have a peculiar blend of Southern and Midwestern identities.

At the same time, Illinois (like most other States seen so far) has undergone some significant shifts in its internal geography, as this 1960-2012 comparison highlights (Republicans wins by 10 and 8 points, respectively):



The trend seems quite clear: southern Illinois (especially southeastern Illinois) has moved sharply to the right, with most of its counties giving Romney results over 60%. Meanwhile, Democrats seem to have gained in the northern half of the State, most notably along the border with Iowa. Clearly southern IL has been caught in the same dynamic as the rest of the South, the long-term collapse of Democratic support. Meanwhile, Northern Illinois, just like neighboring Iowa and Wisconsin, went from likely R to lean D after the 1980s. Still, being deprived of Chicago's influence, Democrats will generally face an uphill battle in Illinois.

Capital: Springfield remains the obvious choice.

Governor: Bill Brady would have no trouble getting elected here.

Senators: Dick Durbin (class 2) and Mark Kirk (class 3). The funny thing is that, while Illinois would keep the same Senators as IRL, their electoral positions would be essentially flipped: Durbin is probably facing a very close race for his reelection this year, while Kirk was swept to office in 2010 and has a decent shot at winning again in 2016 (his biggest fear should be a conservative primary challenge).

Representatives: Easily holding the trifecta after 2010, the Republicans would have several options to go with. As Muon has demonstrated, it is possible to draw a gerrymander that perfectly dilutes Democratic strength throughout the State, resulting in six districts with lean-R to likely-R ratings. That said, I'm not sure Republican would be ready to take such a big risk (all 6 districts voted for Romney in 2012, but for Obama in 2008). Maybe they'd choose instead to work a Democratic vote sink packing together East St. Louis, Springfield and Peoria, so as to keep 5 seats safe? I'm not sure, but for lack of an alternative proposal I'll stick with Muon's. So 6R-0D.
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Gass3268
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« Reply #266 on: October 10, 2014, 11:47:40 AM »

Just a heads up that Mark Kirk lives in Highland Park in Lake County, which means he'd be in the Chicago state.
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #267 on: October 10, 2014, 12:02:39 PM »

Just a heads up that Mark Kirk lives in Highland Park in Lake County, which means he'd be in the Chicago state.

Yeah I know, but he was born in Champaign and lived in downstate IL up till college (he transferred to Cornell afterwards). If he wanted to seek a political career, he'd be quite a fool to move to Chicago State, where his opportunities would be extremely limited. I'd say he'd be most likely to stay in his native State. But anyway, if it wasn't Kirk, it could have been Patrick Hughes instead.
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OAM
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« Reply #268 on: October 10, 2014, 02:08:44 PM »

Really, considering Kirk is definitely a Republican I can live with, please let him stay down here.  Please Tongue

We're doomed with Brady anyway though...
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #269 on: October 18, 2014, 01:16:14 PM »

PVI comparison



As the previous two posts had already shown, Illinois and Chicago have very little in common in terms of their political evolution. Unsurprisingly, Chicago has always been the most Democratic of the two States since at least the 1960s, but this is not the most interesting aspect of the above chart. What's really striking is how differently the two States have evolved over time.

Chicago displays the familiar pattern that we have already seen in many Northeastern States: a Dem-leaning State that moves more and more towards the democrats throughout the 90s and 2000s, reaching stronghold territory. It seems crazy today, but in two instances Chicago was actually more favorable to Republican candidates than the country as a whole (in 1964, it reacted with limited enthusiasm to the LBJ wave, and in 1976 Carter only eked out a win there). Those two years were particular, but it's only after 1992 that Chicago could be safely counted in the Democratic  column. In the early 2000s, it reached landslide territory, and doesn't seem to be coming back anytime soon.

For Illinois, instead, the picture is much less clear. From the beginning of the period, the State was clearly in the Republican column, although the strength of this leaning varied significantly. But interestingly, Democrats seemed to actually gain ground during the 1980s and even moved Illinois to lean-D in 1988 and 1992. However, this trend reversed itself after 1992, and, with the exception of a slight uptick under Obama in 2008, Democrats have done worse in every election since. In 2012, Romney overperformed by 12 points there, the best result for a Republican candidate over the entire period.

As a result, OTL Illinois' mythical 32 years of uninterrupted Democratic trend from 1976 to 2008 seems to be nothing more than an illusion resulting from the combining of these two very different evolutions. If you're looking for a starting point in Democratic growth in Chicago, 1988 is the way to go, not 1976 (in relative terms, Dukakis lost ground compared to 1984). Meanwhile, the Republican drift of Illinois clearly started after 1992 (which followed the Democratic gains of 1980-1992). All this resulted in a considerable drift: in 1988, Chicago was only 4 points more Democratic than Illinois; in 2012, this gap was of 36 points. Clearly, OTL Illinois is increasingly suffering from split personality.




I'll try to wrap up the two snoozefests that are Michigan and Wisconsin by the end of this week, so that we can move on to more interesting States in the West. Wink
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Antonio the Sixth
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« Reply #270 on: October 22, 2014, 11:11:29 AM »

Michigan

With barely 300,000 inhabitants (less than half a Congressional District), Michigan's Upper Peninsula never left much of a mark in Michigan politics. As a result, the State wouldn't look much different without it.

MI Presidential election results, 1960-2012:


As you can see, no Presidential winner has changed, and even the magnitude of their victory has remained almost identical. There really isn't much to see here. The PVI curves of old and new Michigan are also nearly identical.



In the last two decades, removing the UP has brought a benefit to Democrats of less than half a point (although funnily enough, this is enough to change the sign of MI's 1996-2000 trend, from R to D). In the past however, the UP was actually a bit more Democratic than the rest of the State (most notably in 1984 and 1988), meaning that this change would have weakened the Dem's position. Still, we're talking of really minimal changes.

Capital: Still Lansing

Governor: Still Rick Snyder, still facing a close reelection contest.

Senators: Still Debbie Stabenow (class 1) and Carl Levin (class 2)

Representatives: The Republicans' control over the State Legislature would also remain virtually unchanged, meaning that the gerrymander would still be there. Michigan would keep its 14 Congressional Districts as well, which means that CDs would be somewhat smaller in population. In terms of party split, it probably also stays the same at 9R-5D.
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Mr. Smith
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« Reply #271 on: October 23, 2014, 12:07:06 AM »

Now for Wisconsin right?
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
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« Reply #272 on: October 23, 2014, 04:24:23 AM »


Yeah, Wisconsin's next (though not much more interesting than Michigan).
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pbrower2a
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« Reply #273 on: October 24, 2014, 06:08:14 PM »

Michigan would be more interesting if it were shorn of Wayne, Washtenaw, Oakland, Macomb, and (for contiguity to Erie, to which it belongs) Lenawee and Monroe Counties.

I'd be tempted to graft South Bend and Milwaukee into "Chicagoland".
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Antonio the Sixth
Antonio V
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« Reply #274 on: October 26, 2014, 02:02:29 PM »
« Edited: October 26, 2014, 02:10:13 PM by Antonio V »

Wisconsin

Since Wisconsin is smaller, the transfer of the Upper Peninsula has a somewhat more significant impact on it than it had on Michigan (it would represent about 5% of the new State's population). Still, WI's political outlook under this scenario is generally unchanged.

WI Presidential election results, 1960-2012:


Actually, adding the UP did make a difference in the State's Presidential vote once: in 2000, Bush would have edged Gore by a narrow 0.16 points margin (Gore won by 0.22 points IRL). This Republican gain could make a huge difference in the bitterly-fought 2000 election, although the Florida split more than makes up for it in Gore's favor. Also to note, Kerry's 2004 win manages to survive, but it's reduced from 0.38 points to a razor-thin 0.02 points (ie, less than 500 votes) lead. These are significant results due to Wisconsin's status as a key battleground State in the early 2000s, but in numerical terms, the shifts remain trivially small. The PVI chart puts things in perspective:



As you can see, at no point did the new State differ significantly from the old by more than half a point or so. Before 2000, it's even hard to tell which party benefited from the change, though in recent times it seems to have helped Republicans - for what little it's worth.

Capital: Still Madison

Governor: Still Scott Walker

Senators: Still Tammy Baldwin (class 1) and Ron Johnson (class 3)

Representatives: The UP is not big enough to earn Wisconsin an additional CD in the current census (it would have brought its delegation from 2002 to 2012 to 9 seats, though). With Republicans still controlling the legislature, the makeup of WI's delegation probably would remain 5R-3D (the UP is neither big nor Republican enough to give the GOP the opportunity to dilute Democrats further).
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