US House Redistricting: Texas

[krazen1211]

Interview about Texas redistricting.


http://hotlineoncall.nationaljournal.com/archives/2011/01/redistricting-q-2.php

MA: I think their starting place will be to try to hold their districts. And they'll do that by keeping the minority percentage the same, but putting in high-voting Anglo-Republicans. High turnout Republicans. What they did this time is they won because you had high turnout among Anglos who vote straight-ticket Republican.

And then they will draw a new Hispanic district in Dallas County and just say that that's a new Hispanic district. Because you can draw it there and not hurt any incumbent. Then they'll draw some kind of Hispanic district, or at least I'll call it a "Hispanic district" from Austin, South. But rather than leave the rest of Travis County for Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D), they'll break up Travis County into three or four pieces.

So Doggett will face a tough race. Either they'll get rid of him by putting him a Republican district or they'll make him run in a Hispanic district. Doggett's been elected in a Hispanic district before; maybe he can do it again. But it keeps Democrats from netting up seats. So then, in effect, what they will have done is created three new Republican districts.



I don't know if I agree with that, but its an interesting point to ponder. It makes much more sense to me just to draw a circle in Travis County and move on.

I don't know where this idea that there's going to be another hispanic majority Dem district in South Texas. I see no reason at all to draw one. If there has to be an 8th hispanic majority district it should use the idea posted above and just rearrange the 3 existing Houston districts.

So, in other words, they're going to follow the initial plan of my maps.  But no one will have the guts to go and draw Midland-Odessa with the border and a Webb County split.  It works - quite well, I might add. 55% McCain.

I wouldn't say nobody. Tom Delay might, if they can find a way to contract him from prison.

I still believe the cleanest solution is 26-10, Austin Pack, 3 GOP marginals (Canseco, Farenholdt, and whomever gets the new district), and 7 hispanic majority districts. LULAC will probably complain no matter what you do.

I don't see any court forcing any type of Austin to San Antonio district, which is really just a waste of Republican votes and forces you to crack the Austin liberal whites. I'm going to try to work on a map to use TX 13, 19, and 11 and utterly chop Austin into bits.

The Austin-San Antonio thing won't be forced either, I agree. 

But since I can chop Austin into bits in map #2 with McCain % being 57.50% in all the Austin choppers (map#2 I've designed has it being Smith, Canseco, Neugebauer and Flores!) I don't view it as being that big of a wast. 

Map 2 is the 27-9 map, right? 3 Houston, 2 Dallas, 1 El Paso, 1 San Antonio, 2 South Texas?

[dpmapper]

The issue is that I can't get Farenthold's CD above McCain 52% with 60% Hispanics in its current configuration or something close.  You go to the north and east and you pick up too many whites.

I got a Farenthold district at 50% McCain, 65% Hispanic:
https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=129772.msg2765676#msg2765676

You could probably modify it to get 52% McCain, 60% Hispanic pretty easily.  

I should have clarified - without making it look *butt-ugly*.  

But even with that, you should seriously think about f-ing Cuellar.  The trick is going up to Midland-Odessa, pulling in rural counties  around that area in west Texas (which have lots of Hispanics) and splitting Webb.

Not any uglier than some of your dangling arms.   You could call it the Hispanic hook from hell.   :-p

I'm toying with combining that with an Austin-San Antonio VRA district... might be able to get to 25 GOP 2 lean 9 Dem whilst adding two Hispanic seats. 

[Sam Spade]

Interview about Texas redistricting.


http://hotlineoncall.nationaljournal.com/archives/2011/01/redistricting-q-2.php

MA: I think their starting place will be to try to hold their districts. And they'll do that by keeping the minority percentage the same, but putting in high-voting Anglo-Republicans. High turnout Republicans. What they did this time is they won because you had high turnout among Anglos who vote straight-ticket Republican.

And then they will draw a new Hispanic district in Dallas County and just say that that's a new Hispanic district. Because you can draw it there and not hurt any incumbent. Then they'll draw some kind of Hispanic district, or at least I'll call it a "Hispanic district" from Austin, South. But rather than leave the rest of Travis County for Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D), they'll break up Travis County into three or four pieces.

So Doggett will face a tough race. Either they'll get rid of him by putting him a Republican district or they'll make him run in a Hispanic district. Doggett's been elected in a Hispanic district before; maybe he can do it again. But it keeps Democrats from netting up seats. So then, in effect, what they will have done is created three new Republican districts.



I don't know if I agree with that, but its an interesting point to ponder. It makes much more sense to me just to draw a circle in Travis County and move on.

I don't know where this idea that there's going to be another hispanic majority Dem district in South Texas. I see no reason at all to draw one. If there has to be an 8th hispanic majority district it should use the idea posted above and just rearrange the 3 existing Houston districts.

So, in other words, they're going to follow the initial plan of my maps.  But no one will have the guts to go and draw Midland-Odessa with the border and a Webb County split.  It works - quite well, I might add. 55% McCain.

I wouldn't say nobody. Tom Delay might, if they can find a way to contract him from prison.

I still believe the cleanest solution is 26-10, Austin Pack, 3 GOP marginals (Canseco, Farenholdt, and whomever gets the new district), and 7 hispanic majority districts. LULAC will probably complain no matter what you do.

I don't see any court forcing any type of Austin to San Antonio district, which is really just a waste of Republican votes and forces you to crack the Austin liberal whites. I'm going to try to work on a map to use TX 13, 19, and 11 and utterly chop Austin into bits.

The Austin-San Antonio thing won't be forced either, I agree. 

But since I can chop Austin into bits in map #2 with McCain % being 57.50% in all the Austin choppers (map#2 I've designed has it being Smith, Canseco, Neugebauer and Flores!) I don't view it as being that big of a wast. 

Map 2 is the 27-9 map, right? 3 Houston, 2 Dallas, 1 El Paso, 1 San Antonio, 2 South Texas?

1 San Antonio-Austin

I can get you 27 McCain districts (25 being 54% or above, 24 being 57.50% or more) with at least 9 Hispanic-majority districts at 60% or more.  But you can probably only count on 26, as the 27th will have to be a kind-of-strange rural district.  The GOP won one of the HDs this year that would almost certainly be in the 27th, and there's the party-switcher, so there will be possible candidates

[krazen1211]

Actually, the problem with so many CDs is that it makes it harder for you to open up your eyes and see the best solution, which in Texas is 1) combine Cuellar and Hinojosa together - the geography works; 2) split Webb County; 3) include Midland/Odessa in a border CD.

I just tried this. Utterly, utterly brilliant, if I got it right.

I am not sure about your intention, though, is the intention for the Midland district to be Hispanic? Because I didn't see exactly how to get it there, nor do I see a reason to. I just used my CD-11 to dilute those hyperdem 80% counties.




CD-16, CD-20 - Whatever.

CD-23 - 62% Hispanic, 55% McCain

CD-28 - 59% Hispanic, 52% McCain

CD-27 - 59% Hispanic, 53% McCain

CD-33 - new Republican 57% McCain district

CD-11 - now *only* 67% McCain

CD-25 - packed in Lloyd Doggett district

You really limit the Democrats to 1 district in South Texas, and that's TX-15. From here you just rampage over the rest of the map.

[Sam Spade]

don't include San Angelo, but include Midland.  don't go too far west into central Texas.  Pick through the El Paso precincts for strong Hispanic ones.

I've gotten 60.54% Hispanic and 57.32% McCain; 62.73% Hispanic and 55.09% McCain.  Plus, if you include Midland, you get Conaway as an incumbent in a district with a lot of strange rural counties where it's too GOP for Pete Gallego to take a chance.

[minionofmidas]

Forget dreaming. You're not going to get these things past any court, if the TX23 decision is any indication.

[Brittain33]

What is the impact if Republicans in the legislature decide they'd rather create a seat for one of themselves instead of shoring up a flake like Farenthold in a marginal part of the state?

[minionofmidas]

They pretty much have to add some territory to the border seats and create an additional seat there. Not trying to make that an R seat would be silly. Going north from Corpus and drawing a seat for Farenthold is the obvious choice - otherwise you're forced to do the kind of map krazen and Sam are talking about further west.
Obviously, you could make it a whole lot more marginal on the basis of "look at the seat he won in 2010", but...

[krazen1211]

Forget dreaming. You're not going to get these things past any court, if the TX23 decision is any indication.

Unless you know something about Anthony Kennedy that nobody else does, it shouldn't be any indication.

There's no retrogression, and TX-23, TX-27, and TX-28 all resemble their current shapes. Plus, you get 2 new Hispanic districts TX-33 and TX-9.

[Sam Spade]

They pretty much have to add some territory to the border seats and create an additional seat there. Not trying to make that an R seat would be silly. Going north from Corpus and drawing a seat for Farenthold is the obvious choice - otherwise you're forced to do the kind of map krazen and Sam are talking about further west.
Obviously, you could make it a whole lot more marginal on the basis of "look at the seat he won in 2010", but...

Lewis, you're basically forced to go north on Farenthold regardless of whether you do the thing out west I'm talking about if you want to give him a McCain CD.  I'm working on trying to get him to 53% or 54% while staying above 60% Hispanic, but it ain't easy, and is probably as far as I can go.

As for Texas, what is pretty clear is this - you have 24 obvious GOP seats and 7 obvious Dem seats (3 Houston, 2 Dallas, 1 San Antonio, 1 El Paso, 4-5 Hispanic minority majority) in a fairly nice looking map, irregardless.  What's left is Doggett, Cuellar, Hinojosa, Canseco and Farenthold.  Drawing Canseco into a new north Bexar and other district is rather easy, so you'll create an open seat.

As for the rest, another Dem seat has to either be the Hispanic-majority Austin to San Antonio thing I mentioned or the Austin pack.  The Hispanics will insist (especially with Austin pack, but with other too) that the others be Hispanic-majority, and it is hard for me to disagree there because the numbers support it.

So we're left with an OK district for Farenthold and even though I can get one of the others into marginal status (kinda), with South Texas this is always a question mark.

That's where the west idea comes from.  And don't think it has no chance in the courts - under the rules laid out by Kennedy, it is a much stronger argument, as it will 1) have a CVAP of over 50% and 2) be fairly compact (less important argument).

[krazen1211]

don't include San Angelo, but include Midland.  don't go too far west into central Texas.  Pick through the El Paso precincts for strong Hispanic ones.

I've gotten 60.54% Hispanic and 57.32% McCain; 62.73% Hispanic and 55.09% McCain.  Plus, if you include Midland, you get Conaway as an incumbent in a district with a lot of strange rural counties where it's too GOP for Pete Gallego to take a chance.

Wait, are you talking about TX-23 (Canseco, the light blue district) or TX-11 (Conoway, the light green district?)

I'm not sure whether you are trying to create 3 McCain Hispanic districts or 4. I found making 3 to be relatively easy. The only question is what you do with the remaining half of Webb County; I chose to just dump it obviously.

[dpmapper]

As for Texas, what is pretty clear is this - you have 24 obvious GOP seats and 7 obvious Dem seats (3 Houston, 2 Dallas, 1 San Antonio, 1 El Paso, 4-5 Hispanic minority majority) in a fairly nice looking map, irregardless.  What's left is Doggett, Cuellar, Hinojosa, Canseco and Farenthold.  Drawing Canseco into a new north Bexar and other district is rather easy, so you'll create an open seat.

As for the rest, another Dem seat has to either be the Hispanic-majority Austin to San Antonio thing I mentioned or the Austin pack.  The Hispanics will insist (especially with Austin pack, but with other too) that the others be Hispanic-majority, and it is hard for me to disagree there because the numbers support it.

One could try to make the Austin-to-San Antonio Hispanic seat the same as the San Antonio Dem seat... that's getting really ambitious but I can make that happen in some configurations.  Might require too many districts pitching in to chop the rest of Austin, though. 

[Brittain33]

One could try to make the Austin-to-San Antonio Hispanic seat the same as the San Antonio Dem seat... that's getting really ambitious but I can make that happen in some configurations.  Might require too many districts pitching in to chop the rest of Austin, though. 

Bexar has close to 1,000,000 Hispanic residents according to the 2009 Census estimates; Travis has about 300,000. You need more than one district for everyone.

[Brittain33]

Ok, another question. Shouldn't Republicans be worried about banking on multiple 52-54% McCain, 60+% Hispanic districts in places where nearly all of the population growth in the next 10 years is going to make the districts more Democratic?

[krazen1211]

Ok, another question. Shouldn't Republicans be worried about banking on multiple 52-54% McCain, 60+% Hispanic districts in places where nearly all of the population growth in the next 10 years is going to make the districts more Democratic?

I don't think anyone is banking on them (although R+5 to R+7 is not all that unsafe), but what else can you do with the territory?

Between the existing 15, 23, 27, 28 Obama I think won all 4 districts. If you could retrogress you'd just pack 1 of the 4 and create safe McCain districts with the other 3, but you can't.

It's not like you're weakening the remaining 24 districts by monkeying around with 23, 27, 28.

[minionofmidas]

What you're trying to do is eliminate a Hispanic opportunity seat (that is, a seat in which the victor will be reliant on widespread Hispanic support), while technically fulfilling a random cutoff line and while creating unnecessarily disparate, huge constituencies in particularly empty minority country. You're doing exactly what the TX-23 decision says you can't do in West Texas, except with several districts. And run the risk of the same thing happening again - your seats struck down and your evil plans for other seats thwarted as an indirect consequence.


At which point I went to read the SC decision, because I think I've only ever read the district court's.

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Yeah, seems to me like they're saying "random figures like 60% or whatever are not of primary relevance. What matters is the outcome". Oh, and also "what Justice Kennedy thinks is not of primary relevance. These dudes are actually slightly more important - we're unlikely to flat out overturn them unless they unduly provoke us, even if we don't like their reasoning (this is, after all, what they did with TX23 - change the parts of the reasoning that they didn't like while upholding the outcome).
Oh, and here:

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Yeah, (largely) non-voting Hispanic communities in the Permian Basin and parts of the panhandle are just about the posterbook case for what's described here.

Ok, another question. Shouldn't Republicans be worried about banking on multiple 52-54% McCain, 60+% Hispanic districts in places where nearly all of the population growth in the next 10 years is going to make the districts more Democratic?

I don't think anyone is banking on them (although R+5 to R+7 is not all that unsafe), but what else
can you do with the territory?

In this case and with these districts... actually I find em quite unsafe. At even money, I'd bet on your TX27 and TX28 voting for Hispanic Democrats most of the time.  Your TX23 wouldn't, but (in conjunction with that 11th) it's not going to last long. It's a fairly unequivocal dilution of Latino voting strength.
The bizarre thing is that from a personal preferences pov, I like a compact Lower Valley district... (though yours isn't as compact as it ought to be)... and that you're at current throwing the gain away by conceding a seat to Doggett. Which is what "ought" to be done, of course, but probably isn't strictly necessary and probably won't be done. Sam's earlier plan to set him up for a battle against Ciro Rodriguez is a very good idea is a very good idea to get rid of him. (Though if I were Canseco I wouldn't have liked Sam's plan at all, actually - safe from the Democrats, but thrown to the Anglo Primary wolves.)

[minionofmidas]

Forget dreaming. You're not going to get these things past any court, if the TX23 decision is any indication.

Unless you know something about Anthony Kennedy that nobody else does, it shouldn't be any indication.

The more I think about it, the surer I am that I know Kennedy's mind on VRA issues quite well.

"I'd much rather not be having to think about them anymore at all. It is my duty to hear these cases, but I am somewhat unlikely to actually listen. Unfortunately not one of my colleagues can be trusted on them, but thankfully most of the lower courts can, and while I reserve the right to contradict them, it is rather unlikely that I will."

[dpmapper]

One could try to make the Austin-to-San Antonio Hispanic seat the same as the San Antonio Dem seat... that's getting really ambitious but I can make that happen in some configurations.  Might require too many districts pitching in to chop the rest of Austin, though. 

Bexar has close to 1,000,000 Hispanic residents according to the 2009 Census estimates; Travis has about 300,000. You need more than one district for everyone.

It's not like all of those Hispanic residents live in areas that need to be part of the Dem pack.  Especially if a good number of them are used in a San Antonio+points south Hispanic marginal seat.  

[Sam Spade]

What you're trying to do is eliminate a Hispanic opportunity seat (that is, a seat in which the victor will be reliant on widespread Hispanic support), while technically fulfilling a random cutoff line and while creating unnecessarily disparate, huge constituencies in particularly empty minority country. You're doing exactly what the TX-23 decision says you can't do in West Texas, except with several districts. And run the risk of the same thing happening again - your seats struck down and your evil plans for other seats thwarted as an indirect consequence.

I'm basically not worried about that.  Any court-designed map based on present gerrymander (which is what they'll do) is going to be hard not to make 24-12, especially if you play Austin-pack and sacrifice Canseco to the Anglo wolves.  Getting seat #25, in almost any way you design it, becomes quite difficult unless you can do what I did or convince them to let you create an Anglo-majority district for Farenthold.  Any Hispanic minority-majority district with Farenthold can be made stronger, but not safe.  There is, at least, a GOP institutional base in Nueces, so if he screws up, the CD is certainly not lost for good.

As for the rest of your points on LULAC v. Perry I respectfully disagree.  Maybe more later.  The last two Texas maps have gone to the Supremes, so I wouldn't be surprised if Kennedy is involved again.

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My point about TX-23 is, once again, how is it dilution of Latino voting strength if, where they are located, they vote more Republican than in other places?  That wasn't really at issue in LULAC, as they voted rather predictably in its prior iteration.  TX-11 is 30% Hispanic, after all, in present form.  Is it a requirement now that you have enough Hispanics that vote Democratic consistently in order for compactness to be met?

My TX-15 and TX-28 are pure border districts and quite legal, regardless of the fact that I can get one of them to potential marginal status if I make Farenthold weaker.  I recognize who they'll probably elect, but that's not the point. 

Lastly, Farenthold's CD will have to push north to take in San Antonio suburbs anyway if you want to make it a good partisan gerrymander with enough Hispanic votes.

[krazen1211]

What you're trying to do is eliminate a Hispanic opportunity seat (that is, a seat in which the victor will be reliant on widespread Hispanic support), while technically fulfilling a random cutoff line and while creating unnecessarily disparate, huge constituencies in particularly empty minority country. You're doing exactly what the TX-23 decision says you can't do in West Texas, except with several districts. And run the risk of the same thing happening again - your seats struck down and your evil plans for other seats thwarted as an indirect consequence.


At which point I went to read the SC decision, because I think I've only ever read the district court's.

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Yeah, seems to me like they're saying "random figures like 60% or whatever are not of primary relevance. What matters is the outcome". Oh, and also "what Justice Kennedy thinks is not of primary relevance. These dudes are actually slightly more important - we're unlikely to flat out overturn them unless they unduly provoke us, even if we don't like their reasoning (this is, after all, what they did with TX23 - change the parts of the reasoning that they didn't like while upholding the outcome).
Oh, and here:

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Yeah, (largely) non-voting Hispanic communities in the Permian Basin and parts of the panhandle are just about the posterbook case for what's described here.

Ok, another question. Shouldn't Republicans be worried about banking on multiple 52-54% McCain, 60+% Hispanic districts in places where nearly all of the population growth in the next 10 years is going to make the districts more Democratic?

I don't think anyone is banking on them (although R+5 to R+7 is not all that unsafe), but what else
can you do with the territory?

In this case and with these districts... actually I find em quite unsafe. At even money, I'd bet on your TX27 and TX28 voting for Hispanic Democrats most of the time.  Your TX23 wouldn't, but (in conjunction with that 11th) it's not going to last long. It's a fairly unequivocal dilution of Latino voting strength.
The bizarre thing is that from a personal preferences pov, I like a compact Lower Valley district... (though yours isn't as compact as it ought to be)... and that you're at current throwing the gain away by conceding a seat to Doggett. Which is what "ought" to be done, of course, but probably isn't strictly necessary and probably won't be done. Sam's earlier plan to set him up for a battle against Ciro Rodriguez is a very good idea is a very good idea to get rid of him. (Though if I were Canseco I wouldn't have liked Sam's plan at all, actually - safe from the Democrats, but thrown to the Anglo Primary wolves.)

The rest of that opinion, though, specifically referenced CVAP and the ability (or inability) to vote for a candidate. The fact that those people don't vote is their own problem.

In any case, the damage is fairly contained. Even if you are correct, all that probably will happen is the 11th and 23rd flipping territory, with the 23rd becoming a 54-55% Obama Laredo to San Antonio seat and the 11th covering the entire empty area. There's little risk I see to the new 28th and new 27th, which are about 6 points more Republican than they were.

The gain, though, isn't Doggett's seat. It's Cuellar's, who would have to run in either the light blue west Texas district or the pink district that doesn't include Laredo. The pink district is a new district intended for some new Republican to run in.

Someone is going to be suing no matter what they do. I doubt that stops anyone. And didn't the district court, or the appeals court, uphold the fajita strip TX-25?

[Sam Spade]

Btw, I may create a version of said map (talked about above in great extent) which leaves Cuellar and Webb intact, thus leaving us to argue whether the fact Canseco and Farenthold got elected in TX-23 and TX-27 means that the Hispanic majority is exercising its vote differently now. 

[minionofmidas]

My TX-15 and TX-28 are pure border districts and quite legal, regardless of the fact that I can get one of them to potential marginal status if I make Farenthold weaker. 

Wait... which map again? My whole "courts'll strike it down" argument is in reference to krazen's map (and probably the new one you're promising), not your first attempt. Your first attempt looks to me like it ought to stand.

The rest of that opinion, though, specifically referenced CVAP and the ability (or inability) to vote for a candidate.

Yes, but only because that was quite enough on its own to strike it down. It's VRA case law. There aren't any sufficient conditions to prove a district is fine, only necessary conditions. 

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The most likely remedy; but also your best-case scenario once the seats have been struck down. They could easily redraw a few more seats while they're at it, as they did in the TX23 case.

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Yeah, I was comparing to a hypothetical unposted combination of your and Sam's maps in which they were both targetted. I ought to be technically possible... or would be without the VRA. Anyways, if the Delaymander is anything to go by (possibly not), TX Reps'll be more interested in targetting Doggett than Cuellar.

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Oh, quite. The question is, how far will they get?

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The District Court *technically* did, or pretended they did, really. The SC expressly struck it down. The SC decision is really just adapting the DC's logic to better fit the precedent without having to change the outcome, though.

[minionofmidas]

Btw, I may create a version of said map (talked about above in great extent) which leaves Cuellar and Webb intact, thus leaving us to argue whether the fact Canseco and Farenthold got elected in TX-23 and TX-27 means that the Hispanic majority is exercising its vote differently now. 

I fully expect the state of Texas to make such an argument, actually. And I don't even think it's wholly inaccurate - Ortiz probably got ousted because he was getting too old and people were tired of him.

[minionofmidas]

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Yeah, I was comparing to a hypothetical unposted combination of your and Sam's maps in which they were both targetted. I ought to be technically possible... or would be without the VRA. Anyways, if the Delaymander is anything to go by (possibly not), TX Reps'll be more interested in targetting Doggett than Cuellar.

Which still makes for a counting error on my part, given that Sam was replacing Doggett with another Democrat. Just noticed that. Sorry.

[krazen1211]

I would just say the opposite, actually. Part of the point of Delaymandering was to target Cuellar, who wasn't a member of the House yet.

Cuellar almost knocked off Henry Bonilla, so they wanted to knock down the Hispanic % there and remove Laredo from the 23rd. Targeting Doggett was indirect and mostly a side effect because they needed to make a replacement district.

As it stands, last time, they only changed the minimum number of districts required, which was 5 if I recall, and they only made the minimal changes required.

In any case, here's the first redistricting bill. It's set up around 32 districts rather than 36, if someone wants to poke through it.

http://www.connectamarillo.com/news/story.aspx?id=562653