US House Redistricting: General

[lfromnj]

Do we think that Republicans are likely to draw Jim Cooper out of a seat following 2020?  It is really easy to carve up Nashville given how Republican the surrounding districts are (and since Nashville is actually only moderately Democratic-leaning itself).

I don't know if I'd call 60-34 a moderately Democratic leaning county, but yes. We can probably assume that unless the Supreme Court rules partisan gerrymandering unconstitutional the Nashville, Louisville, and maybe Kansas City seats will be ripped apart. 

Louisville cannot be gerrymandered, Anne Northup was the last stand there and Louisville got bluer and bluer until it voted out Anne Northup, Kansas City will make one of the Western MO seats competitive. Out of these, Nashville is probably the most feasible, but I don't think Republicans want to gerrymander Democratic cities and create dummymanders, as they did in NJ, VA, TX, and GA

Ky03 is Clinton +15 and Ky 4 and Ky 2 are Trump +36 and Trump +40. Easily able to combine all  for something around Trump +20 on average. Safe R.

Problem for the GOP is the KY constitution forbids more county splitting than necessary which Ky 03 can only be made to around Clinton+8 or something like that so you might as well pack it so everyone is happy.

[lfromnj]

This is what I would expect an aggresive MNDFL to draw. 4 likely/Safe Metro districts + one duluth/rochester district. And if Peterson survives 2020 he can get a district that mostly resembles Basically forces  Stauber and Hagedorn to run against each other in a primary to face a democrat in a very mildy Tossup/Lean Republican district.

[lfromnj]

If you drawing a fair map you should draw it using 2016 and then estimate with the boundaries for 2010.

Population change is pretty big.

[lfromnj]

Not acceptable because a Gary to indy district isn't for some reason.(jk both parties will do this)

[lfromnj]

Are National Democrats still fine with Virginia Democrats letting the voters approve a measure that would turn over redistricting from the legislature to the 6-1 Republican Supreme Court? If so, this has to be one of the dumbest moves blinded by self-righteousness I’ve ever seen

Even if the commission isn't there the GOP will just sue like D's did in PA/NC

[lfromnj]

In fairness, if Dems wanted a majority black district there is not much else they could have done?

2010 redistricting in Missouri actually had a D governor and they had just above 1/3 th emajority in the state house.. The deal was to keep Cleaver and Clay safe from primary challenges but kick out Russ Carnahan and they bribed black delegates to do this as Cleaver and Clay are both black.

So MO 2nd was made a bit safer than in a more fair map and it would have flipped in 2018 without Cleaver and Clay's backstabbing. I don't think a 3rd D district was really possible but I think it would have flipped in 2018 with a more fairly drawn map.

Good on Air Claire for calling them out.

Here's the MO 2nd drawn fairly with 2010 numbers


Blue is 51% black VRA while green is the suburban district that is Trump +6 compared to the current Trump +11, this district was lost by 3 points in 2018 so this new district flips in 2018 by a point or two.(the district goes to St Charles county which is north instead of the more compact Jefferson county because st Charles belongs with the well educated white suburbs of st louis compared to the more WWC Jefferson county which has zoomed super hard right although people didn't know this in 2010.



Here is the district with Jefferson county

This moves it to Trump +10 although Kander won both variations of the green district by 2 points. I guess this variation might have allowed Carnahan to survive in 2012 although he goes down in 2014, not sure if this flips back to D in 2018.