2020 census

[Skill and Chance]

There actually isn't a whole lot new to talk about gerrymandering wise if that's the apportionment.  R's are most at risk to get wiped out in NY, CO and NV and D's are most at risk in AZ and IL.  Court maps would improve D prospects drastically in OH, MI, PA or VA.  If D's somehow take control in OH or PA, expect nuclear war on a map (10 districts into Philly or Cuyahoga).

[Skill and Chance]

Minnesota lawmakers and/or judges will certainly find a way to draw a map with one district including Minneapolis and another district including St. Paul, even if it does not provide every rural resident with the shared representation they would have chosen for themselves.

Or it doesn't go to court next time, in which case we have 4R-3D or 5D-2R...

[Skill and Chance]

So for the states that may gain/lose, what are we looking at?

AL: Would have to lose one R seat due to VRA, 5R-1D
 
AZ: assuming Colleen Mathis isn't chair, 6R-4D with one of the D seats being close

CA: not really predictable, a fair map would produce 37-40D/17-14R by PVI

CO: Probably 6D-2R the way things are going here, could be 5R-3D with court map

FL: probably 18R-10D by PVI, could be as even as 15R-13D if it goes to court

GA: 11R-4D

IL:  Probably 12D-5R, chance of something like 9D-8R in court  

MI: 9R-4D (gerrymander) or 7-6 one way or the other (court map)

MN: probably 5D-2R, might be 4R-3D by PVI, though

MT: interestingly, MT-02 would probably lean D for 1R-1D, a commission draws here

NC: 10R-4D, D's will regret taking away the veto here for many decades

NE: 2-0 R, NE-02 is never in play anymore

NY: Either 20D-5R or 23D-2R

OH: 8R-7D (court map) or 11R-4D (gerrymander), R's very close to 2/3rds in legislature

OR: probably 5D-1R, outside chance at 3D-3R

PA: 12R-5D (gerrymander) or 9R-8D (court map)

VA: likely a court map, 6R-6D or 7R-5D with one of the R seats being an ~R+1 2X Obama seat

RI: 1-0 D (duh), Cicilline would lose the primary to Langevin

TX: they will try for 27R-12D, but they will get sued...

WV: should be 3-0 R by 2020, then the 2 southern districts get combined for 2-0 R

[Skill and Chance]

If St.Louis continues to come out like it did in 2012, it doesn't matter what you add on the south end.  Nolan ran up a 30K lead in St.Louis, and held Cravaack to about 2K in his best counties (Morrison, Isanti, Chisago).  Nolan had a larger margin than that in Itasca.   A curiosity is that Nolan ran 3 to 4% ahead of Obama in the Republican areas, but behind Obama in St.Louis.

In 2010, Oberstar only managed 15K in St.Louis, and Cravaack was getting 3K and 4K out of his counties.  Itasca was almost even.  And Cravaack still barely won.

So you would have 2 solid D districts: MN-4.5 and MN-8, two R districts MN-2 and MN-6, and 3 competitive seats, MN-1, MN-3, and MN-7.

You do have a good point with MN-08. As long as the Iron Range is kept together, MN-08 (and it's successor number) should be safe barring a massive GOP wave year. It doesn't really matter what you add to it, whether it be metro MSP or St. Cloud. Obama circa 2008 wins either incarnation by around 8-10%.

I also think you're mostly right on the partisan stats. I do think all of the districts are potentially winnable for the DFL under the right circumstances (and not necessarily even a wave). Walz should be quite entrenched by next redistricting. I would say the same of Paulsen in MN-03, but 55% Obama could be too much. That MN-06 should be a Republican-leaning district (like MN-02), but not if Bachmann ran there.

Basically, divide the metro districts as Ramsey-Washington, Inner Hennepin, South, and North/West.  As for outstate, I think St. Cloud plus Iron Range makes as least as much sense as any other arrangement of those areas.

I think that if they were to keep Minneapolis and St. Paul separate, and I'm inclined to do so but not totally wedded to it, the right way to carve it up would be to have Minneapolis anchor an all-Hennepin district, and have the exurban areas go north, basically combining MN-3 and MN- 6.

I was drawing more neutral/court-type maps myself (and keeping county splits low, etc), but I could easily see that map passing under a DFL trifecta. It does seem pretty apparent that the three rural Outstate districts are very easily drawn. Your map also supports my theory that only a DFL-drawn map would save Bachmann, by keeping MSP separate and creating a heavily Republican district a la your MN-03. You also do a very good job at attempting to take out Paulsen, whose district would be ripped apart. He'd either have to take on Bachmann in a primary (and lose) or run in a mostly foreign district (MN-02). The DFL would be very smart to obliterate Paulsen's district like you did.

If it's a DFL map, it depends on whether Peterson is still in MN-07 and how mean they are willing to get.  If Peterson wants protection, you can actually give him an Obama 2008 district, but this means that there will be 2 exurban >55% McCain seats.  Paulsen gets a 61% Obama 2008 seat and Ellison and McCollum would both fall to about 62% Obama 2008 to make that happen.  MN-08 stays about where it is now.  If they want to get MD about it, they can also draw Walz into part of St. Paul for a >57% Obama 2008 seat. 

If they concede Peterson's seat, they can make the 2 suburban districts and the Walz seat likely D with one rural and one exurban vote sink.

[Skill and Chance]

How on earth do you get a 23-2 map in New York in a neutral election?

Upstate and downstate ~60% McCain vote sinks with the remainder of the state being like 66% Obama.  You can distribute that evenly enough so that every other seat is 2-time 60% Obama or safer.  Of course NYC would look like O'Malley's Baltimore x10, but I don't think a D trifecta would give a darn after being out of a House majority for 12 years.