2020 Redistricting in Pennsylvania

[Roll Roons]

Here's my go at a PA map, with 2016 partisanship:
https://davesredistricting.org/join/7e597fcd-7654-4f8f-8bb2-46f3df84038b

PA-01: Clinton +1. All of Bucks, a bit of MontCo and some of the more Republican areas in NE Philly. Realistically, this is Likely R while Fitz is around. But it would be extremely competitive without him.

PA-02: Clinton +61. North Philly. Very diverse and very blue, as expected. Boyle's only threat would be in a primary.

PA-03: Clinton +80 or something. In this very district, born and raised, on the playground is where I spent most of my days. You all the know the rest. Black-majority district in Center City and West Philly that also includes some heavily black areas in DelCo. This is probably one of the five most Democratic districts in the country. Evans has this for life.

PA-04: Clinton +27. Most of MontCo and some white liberal parts of Philly. The days of Richard Schweiker are long gone. Dean is safe.

PA-05: Clinton +18. Most of DelCo and eastern ChesCo. Even the vaunted DelCo GOP machine probably won't bring this one back. Scanlon is safe. Houlahan also lives here, but she's rumored to be considering a Senate bid. Otherwise, she can try her luck in...

PA-06: Trump +4. Eastern ChesCo, most of Berks, and northern MontCo. It's actually possible that Biden won it. Regardless, this seat is winnable for both parties and will likely be highly competitive in most years.

PA-07: Trump +3.5. Lehigh, Northampton and Carbon. Again, may have flipped to Biden. But Susan Wild had a surprisingly close race in 2020, and would be vulnerable in this swingy district.

PA-08: Trump +8. Lackawanna, Luzerne, Monroe and Pike. My guess is Trump still won this district in 2020, but Biden made huge inroads here that helped him win the state. Cartwright is strong, but will have a very, very tough fight on his hands.

PA-09: Trump +43. A section of rural northeast PA that has been Republican since the Civil War and probably won't change that anytime soon. Basically combines Meuser and Keller, but the former is rumored to be running for Gov, in which case the latter will sail.

PA-10: Trump +13. Dauphin, most of York County (including the city) and Eastern Cumberland. There are some worrying trends for Republicans in this area, but Perry the insurrectionist should be fine for the next couple cycles.

PA-11: Trump +25. Lancaster, Lebanon and part of York County. Smucker will probably be around for a while.

PA-12: Trump +34. Rural northern/central PA district stretching from the New York border to Cambria County, which was once heavily Democratic but has turned hard right. Johnstown and State College are really the only Democratic enclaves in this district. Thompson is safe.

PA-13: Trump +43. South Central PA district that has been Republican since the Civil War. Speaking of the Civil War, Gettysburg is here. Joyce has it forever.

PA-14: Trump +31. Ancestrally Democratic seat in the state's southwest corner, surrounding Pittsburgh. This area was Democratic until the early 2000s, but has taken a hard-right turn since then, particularly in the Trump era. Reschenthaler may run statewide soon, but in any case, the GOP will have no problem holding it.

PA-15: Trump +6. Suburban and exurban Pittsburgh. Luckily for Lamb, the Pittsburgh suburbs have trended sharply blue in the Trump era, so it's possible that this seat flipped to Biden. Unfortunately for him, it has to expand north to gain Lawrence County, so it becomes slightly more Republican, though definitely not out of reach for a strong Democrat.

PA-16: Trump +24. Northwest PA. Kelly isn't the best incumbent, but Erie is really the only part of this district where Democrats are competitive, and it's not even close to enough to outweigh the rest of it. He's safe.

PA-17: Clinton +26. Urban Pittsburgh. A Rust Belt-flavored city that's undergoing somewhat of a tech boom now. Doyle is obviously safe in a general, but it's possible that he faces issues in a primary despite his long tenure.

So you have 6 Clinton districts and 11 Trump districts. The current PA-09 is blown up. Geography is not very good for Democrats in this state, but in most years, Democrats would have a fair shot at four of those Trump districts, while Republicans would be favored in Clinton-won PA-01 as long as that seat's exceptionally strong incumbent is still around.

[Roll Roons]

Does anyone think if the Dems win the Supreme Court race and get 6-1 that they can maybe convince the court to draw a 11-6 map? I feel like the Dems will be bold in asking considering what will happen in states like FL.

I feel like that would just have so much dummymander potential.

[Roll Roons]

Given that redistricting is divided this time in PA between the parties... and that Dem areas increased in population and GOP areas lost population.  Shouldn't we expect Dems to at least maintain their districts in 2022 or possibly even gain 1?  Am I missing something here?

Cause that's generally not how population growth works.

Population growth can shake things up heavily on the local level, but on the federal level, you need rather drastic changes in order to have major effects. Not only that, but also pop growth needs to be put into context by what's going on in the state, and in almost all instances, said context is way, way, way more important than pop growth.

For instance, with PA. The state is losing a CD, one that likely has to come from the GOP areas that lost population. Now, I know what you're thinking, "Isn't that good? The GOP lose a seat!". Sure, at first it sounds good...until you get into the domino effect. Cause of the population loss, suddenly a bunch of marginal seats have to take in new territory, territory that is heavily R. This outright endangers and probably kills those in the marginals: Cartwright, Lamb, and Wild. This also takes the competitive PA-10 off the table once more.

In summary, just cause the D areas gained in pop doesn't mean it automatically translates to greater electoral prospects.

Exactly.

Here's my map, albeit with 2019 estimates: https://davesredistricting.org/join/7e597fcd-7654-4f8f-8bb2-46f3df84038b

I cut PA-09, but PA-06 and PA-07 end up becoming several points more Republican by absorbing some of its old territory. Population loss in the west also forces Lamb's district (PA-15) to shift right. Because all the non-urban districts have to expand in size, PA-10 takes in more of York County and is now out of reach for Democrats barring a big wave.

[Roll Roons]

Also presidential partisanship alone will not necessarily tell the whole story. A compact Bucks County seat will be Tilt/Lean D at the presidential level but Likely R for Congress as long as Fitz is the incumbent.

[Roll Roons]

The Dems should see if the PA Supreme Court would be willing to crack Philly. Unlikely but it's worth a try with a friendly judicial body.

Cracking Philly doesn't help in the congressional map unless you splits Bucks, the parts of Philly adjoining PA-01 are fairly Republican and the other districts adjoining Philly are already solidly D. PA-01 going into southern Montgomery is actually bluer than if it goes into Philadelphia. My fair map actually does crack Philly a bit to get all three districts in it majority minority, but this hurts Dems by removing the bluest parts of Montgomery from PA-04, turning it into a swing district. (My map compensates for this elsewhere by making PA-10 into a Trump/Biden district)

Incidentally, Bucks + Cheltenham, Abington, Lower Moreland, Bryn Athyn, Rockledge and Jenkintown from Montgomery is exactly one district, and probably enough to be unwinnable for even Fitzpatrick (Clinton+7). The Democrats should push for this.

Fitzpatrick outran Trump by 19 points. He genuinely has one of the strongest local brands of any member of Congress. He could survive a in district that went for Clinton/Biden by high single digits.

[Roll Roons]

I wouldn't be surprised if the Bucks County district gets a bit of Northeast Philly - that's how it was in the 2000s.

[Roll Roons]

So Cartwright gets completely screwed.

Looks like there are five Safe D seats: Four in SEPA and one in Pittsburgh.

PA-06 (ChesCo, Berks and Lebanon), PA-07 (Lehigh Valley) and PA-17 (Pittsburgh suburbs/exurbs) look swingy.

PA-01 (Bucks) should be a swing district on paper, but it's not really one in practice. And we all know exactly why that is.

Everything else should be solidly R.

[Roll Roons]

TBH this map isn't bad outside of that western district.

[Roll Roons]

Also is it a given that Keller will be the Republican who gets drawn out? Or is it still possible that Meuser will instead?

[Roll Roons]

I actually wonder if they'll split Pittsburgh to make a second Biden seat in Western PA.

[Roll Roons]

How many seats do we think could come out of PA now?

My guess is 8 Trump seats and 9 Biden seats.

My guess is only five truly safe Democratic seats - four in SEPA (two in Philly proper, two in the suburbs) and one in Pittsburgh. The Lehigh Valley seat will be perennially close, Fitz is likely unbeatable while he's around, Houlahan will likely have to pick up some redder territory and a suburban Pittsburgh seat will be only light blue at most.

[Roll Roons]

Pretty easy overrule even from a non partisan perspective. The GOP was greedy, they can't go after Wild and try to give Meuser a better seat against Cartwright.

Even a district like the current one leaves Wild very vulnerable.

[Roll Roons]

Ngl, I kind of don't want there to be a swing district in the Harrisburg area because the last thing our country needs is a certain COVID alarmist doctor in Congress.

[Roll Roons]

Ngl, I kind of don't want there to be a swing district in the Harrisburg area because the last thing our country needs is a certain COVID alarmist doctor in Congress.

?
Who’s in Harrisburg?

Eric Feigl-Ding ran for PA-10 in 2018 but placed third in the Dem primary.

[Roll Roons]

The map on the right burned my eyes out.

[Roll Roons]

Good. The other one was an abomination.

[Roll Roons]

What was the split anyway ?

9-8 Biden, though the Scranton and Harrisburg seats only went narrowly to Trump.

[Roll Roons]

And for the record, Fitzpatrick is totally safe. The other map egregiously cracked Bucks and even someone as strong as him would have been in a tough spot.

[Roll Roons]

This is not what a fair map looks like because it gerrymanders to get Democrats to proportionality. Democrats are self-packed into Philly and Pittsburgh.

State-sponsored racial discrimination in housing, leading to 90+% African-American neighborhoods adjacent to places in Bucks County where they were forbidden to live, is not “self-packing.” Using racial discrimination as a justification for unequal distribution of political power is rewarding racists for their success.

If you're using Bucks as an example, the reason Democrats haven't been able to win that seat isn't because of muh "discrimination". In case you forget, Biden carried the current seat by 6 points. Tom Wolf won it by 18 and Bob Casey won it by 15. Fitzpatrick just so happens to be an extremely strong incumbent who maintains a lot of crossover appeal. That's all it is.

All Democrats ever do is bitch and moan about how everything is rigged against them. You're starting to sound like Trump.

[Roll Roons]

I don't agree that self-packing is that bad for Democrats in Pennsylvania anymore. I'd agree that there is some geographic disadvantage for for Democrats in the state (particularly due to the main Democratic concentration being in the corner of the state), but it's not necessarily the result of self-packing. The rural areas have lurched far to the right over the past several years, though really starting (at least in terms of the trend) with Obama in 2008. If you compare 2004 with 2020, Kerry did about 1.3% better on the statewide margin compared to Biden. Their margins in Philadelphia were very similar. Kerry was still getting crushed in the rurals, particularly the ancestral ultra-Republican "T" (James Carville used to refer to the state as Pittsburgh and Philadelphia with Alabama in the middle). Trump's margins in the rurals were astronomical though.

Look at the current 18-district map. It includes two districts contained with Philadelphia and several rural districts across the state. Look at the safest half of the state.

PA-03: 91-8 Biden (Philly)
PA-13: 72-27 Trump (South Central PA)
PA-15: 71-28 Trump (NW Central PA)
PA-02: 70-29 Biden (Philly)
PA-12: 67-31 Trump (NE/North Central PA)
PA-05: 65-34 Biden (DelCo)
PA-09: 65-34 Trump (East Central PA)
PA-18: 65-34 Biden (Pittsburgh)
PA-14: 63-36 Trump (SWPA)

The safest district is indeed far and away Democratic. However, the second and third are both Republican districts. The core urban areas actually somewhat weakened for Democrats in 2020 while the rurals stayed steady or even improved for Republicans. The 2018 map may have taken some decisions that leaned towards Democrats, but the map was eminently logical and fair.

As for the new map, I would've kept a district entirely within Allegheny County (as shown in my map a few pages back). On the other hand, I wouldn't have put Carbon County with the Lehigh Valley. I think Monroe County fits better. I also had the tri-chop of Berks County. It's a hard county to deal with on account of its location if you believe other counties/COIs should be left intact (including the Lehigh Valley, Lancaster County, Chester County, and Bucks County by extension).

Carbon is actually part of the Lehigh Valley.

Monroe is part of the Poconos  like Wayne and Pike.

Say the 2018 court map was the same except they swapped Monroe County out for Carbon County and as much of Monroe as is needed. Do Ds win both seats in 2020?

My guess is Cartwright holds on but Wild loses.