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Gerrymandering. Update: Democrats won the popular vote for the Senate, House, and Presidency, but only control one of those. (1 Viewer)

There’s no way to gerrymander states.  They are what they are.

 
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fatguyinalittlecoat said:
I think it's good.  My hope is that in 2020 the Democrats are gonna get tremendous power, and that they will use it to improve our democracy rather than just to obtain partisan advantage.
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I share this hope but, again, fear that progress will be stymied by so much electoral administrative power being concentrated at the state level. Doing the right thing, in some instances like youcutIchoose or enacting proportional representation (not to hijack), calls for one state to unilaterally "disarm" while other states leaning the other direction politically will simply take advantage of said disarmament. 

But I still want them to do the right thing, too. Electoral reform is in its infancy but it's on its way.

 
the moops said:
Can you explain this a little more?
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The idea that the Senate is gerrymandered.  Gerrymandering involves redrawing lines to benefit a particular political party.  Obviously any political advantage a particular political affiliation may have had for admitting and/or delineating a state has long since passed.  State lines can’t be gerrymandered.

 
jonessed said:
The idea that the Senate is gerrymandered.  Gerrymandering involves redrawing lines to benefit a particular political party.  Obviously any political advantage a particular political affiliation may have had for admitting and/or delineating a state has long since passed.  State lines can’t be gerrymandered.
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That's a bit obvious. But never say "can't." If we convince enough people, we can do almost anything.

 
I just stumbled upon this opinion piece from six months ago in The Hill,  where the author advocates for a watered down version of you cut, I pick (and mentions it) called "Fair Gerrymandering." Basically, each party gets a portion of the state based on the previous election's popular vote totals and can then draw up its districts within its portion in any way it chooses. For example, in a 10 district state where Party A got 60% of the total popular vote in the previous election, Party A could choose any part of the state encompassing 60% of the population and make six districts out of it. Party B would do the same for four districts in its portion.

You'd have to have some basic rules about contiguity and equal populations per district and stuff and it's not at the top of my list of election reforms I'd like to see, but it seems to be a simple and interesting way to solve the current districting problems.

 
jonessed said:
I wouldn’t either.  Not unless I had to.
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That's the problem though. On either side, you are elected official there to serve.  Every decision you make should be open and transparent

In this country it's a freaking competitive sport where you absolutely hate everyone else

If i believed in what i did then dang right i would stand up and explain it.  

 
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jonessed said:
I thought it was obvious too, but the Senate being gerrymandered was brought up.
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The reason the Senate isn't representative isn't gerrymandering. Its because all states get the same number regardless of population. Wyoming has less people than the city of San Francisco and yet it gets 2 senators. This greatly amplifies the power of one vote in Wyoming to the disadvantage of one vote in California. That's a problem.

 
NCCommish said:
The reason the Senate isn't representative isn't gerrymandering. Its because all states get the same number regardless of population. Wyoming has less people than the city of San Francisco and yet it gets 2 senators. This greatly amplifies the power of one vote in Wyoming to the disadvantage of one vote in California. That's a problem.
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That's a serious structural flaw. It was a half-azzed compromise 200 years ago and it's even less representative now.

No other modern country does it like this because the flaws are so obvious.

 
U.S. judges order Ohio's Republican-drawn congressional districts revamped
 

(Reuters) - A panel of three federal judges on Friday ruled Ohio’s Republican-drawn congressional map is based on unconstitutional partisan gerrymandering and ordered it to be redone before the 2020 presidential election.

The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio ordered the state to create a plan to fix the map by June 14. The ruling comes in a lawsuit brought last year by the League of Women Voters and the American Civil Liberties Union against the state’s attorney general, challenging the state’s congressional map in 2012 that benefited Republicans.

“We are convinced by the evidence that this partisan gerrymander was intentional and effective and that no legitimate justification accounts for its extremity,” the court said.

In a similar ruling last week, a federal court in Michigan ordered that state’s Republican-controlled legislature to redraw nearly three dozen state and U.S. congressional districts, ruling that the existing lines illegally dilute the power of Democratic voters.
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fatguyinalittlecoat said:
Every state with multiple congressional districts has to redraw the lines for the 2022 election after the 2020 census comes out.
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I didn't think about that.  So is this going to have to be relitigated after those drawings and things are still screwed up or will this ruling also apply to the redraw that was coming anyway?  I don't know if I am making sense :oldunsure:  

 
The Commish said:
I didn't think about that.  So is this going to have to be relitigated after those drawings and things are still screwed up or will this ruling also apply to the redraw that was coming anyway?  I don't know if I am making sense :oldunsure:  
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Well, hopefully the gerrymandering cases in the courts now will lead to generally applicable principles like, for example, “partisan gerrymandering is unconstitutional.”  But yeah, even if that’s established there will be litigation over specific boundaries drawn just like there always is.

 
Surprised this did not get a bump - with the SC decision.

The Supreme Court has ruled against the Virginia House of Delegates in a racial gerrymandering case that represents a victory for Democrats in the state.

It was a 5-4 ruling with Ginsburg, Thomas, Sotomayor, Kagan, and Gorsuch in the majority.

Kyle Griffin‏Verified account @kylegriffin1 34m34 minutes ago

Why the Virginia gerrymander case could be so consequential: The redrawn map realigns 26 House districts. Six Republican delegates would find themselves in districts with a majority of Democratic voters, according to the Virginia Public Access Project. https://wapo.st/2WJzUmp

 
Sinn Fein said:
Surprised this did not get a bump - with the SC decision.

The Supreme Court has ruled against the Virginia House of Delegates in a racial gerrymandering case that represents a victory for Democrats in the state.

It was a 5-4 ruling with Ginsburg, Thomas, Sotomayor, Kagan, and Gorsuch in the majority.

Kyle Griffin‏Verified account @kylegriffin1 34m34 minutes ago

Why the Virginia gerrymander case could be so consequential: The redrawn map realigns 26 House districts. Six Republican delegates would find themselves in districts with a majority of Democratic voters, according to the Virginia Public Access Project. https://wapo.st/2WJzUmp
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This was kind of a sideshow case that addressed a standing issue, not gerrymandering. The North Carolina and Maryland cases, which are still pending but will be decided this month (possibly this Thursday) should get into the heart of partisan gerrymandering law. 

 
fatguyinalittlecoat said:
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/09/05/republicans-redistricting-democrats-1481833

Please make it so.
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This is encouraging indeed. But I remain concerned that Dems are going to whiff on the (possibly) upcoming opportunity to substantially improve elections and representation in this country once they have the power to do so. We need to increase the size of the House and implement multi-member congressional districts with ranked choice (or a version thereof) voting so future elections will be fought fairly. Yeah, and win the state houses, too.

 
roadkill1292 said:
This is encouraging indeed. But I remain concerned that Dems are going to whiff on the (possibly) upcoming opportunity to substantially improve elections and representation in this country once they have the power to do so. We need to increase the size of the House and implement multi-member congressional districts with ranked choice (or a version thereof) voting so future elections will be fought fairly. Yeah, and win the state houses, too.
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Well now you're just being greedy.  

 
We have two new generations of voters who will understand how much better this can be and we libbies need to get them on board and in the voting booths. The opportunity is looming. Trump has killed the GOP for years; the biggest voting demographic in the country thinks Republicans are clueless.

 
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Sheriff Bart said:
So do the Russians. 
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I get your point but I'm pretty serious about this. If Democrats don't fix elections in this country and resort instead to Republican tactics of grabbing and maintaining power while earning minorities of votes (and, yes, Dems do it, too when they can), then we're doomed to the kind of banana republic politics that we've ridiculed for years in Second and Third World nations.

We need better representation in lots of ways and -- [pauses to jab needle into Tim's butt] -- fair methods for third parties to gain representation in Congress.

 
Ooops, my bad.  Was that wrong of me?  :oldunsure:

BREAKING: Republican attorneys send legislature prohibited partisan data during remedial mapmaking

 By Melissa Boughton

The law firm representing Republican legislative leaders in an ongoing partisan gerrymandering case may have just polluted the remedial mapmaking process by sending them partisan data prohibited from use. 

A court last week ordered lawmakers to draw new House and Senate maps after they used unconstitutional partisan gerrymandering to create the 2017 legislative maps, diluting Democratic voting strength. They have 10 days to enact new districts.

The redistricting committees from both chambers met today for the first time to begin the process. They had decided to use baseline maps produced by a plaintiffs’ expert in Common Cause v. Lewis, Jowei Chen.

Chen created 2,000 simulated maps for each chamber for the two-week Common Cause trial — 1,000 maps using only traditional redistricting criteria and 1,000 maps using that criteria and taking incumbency protection into account. Lawmakers did not have the maps and asked both their counsel and the plaintiffs’ counsel for the information.

Chen agreed to send the appropriate map data to lawmakers Monday evening, but in the meantime, Ogletree Deakins — the law firm for the defense — sent the experts’ original files, which contain extensive partisan data, including the partisan scoring of the simulated maps, according to an email sent to the legislature.

The court expressly prohibited lawmakers from using or considering any partisan data at all in the remedial process.

http://pulse.ncpolicywatch.org/2019/09/09/breaking-republican-attorneys-send-lawmakers-prohibited-partisan-data-during-remedial-mapmaking/

 
The Commish said:
They really are scared ####less about this election :lol:

The one tomorrow and the one in 2020 it seems.
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Regarding this one, their fear is probably half about losing and half about their fraud being dragged into the national spotlight again. No reason they couldn't have won it fairly the first time, right? At this point it's salt on a self-inflicted wound.

 
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