Ohio redistricting thread

[ProgressiveModerate]

What about something like this? It generally aims to be least change from the current map, but cleans a few things up and shifts competitive districts right.

OH-01 is cracked to be a Trump + 1 seat and by taking in some rurals, the leftwards trend might be mitigated. OH-08 takes in more of Hamilton, but is still Trump + 15.

OH-09 shifts about a point right by taking in more Republican rurals to the West and Erie County.

OH-10 stays the same because Turner likes his seat and outperforms big time so in practice, it's a safe/likely R seat on the congressional level with Turner even if Presidential partisanship suggests it's closer.

OH-13 shifts right by becoming based in Republican Stark County but still taking in all of Akron. Trump + 3 in 2020.

I shifted OH-15 slightly right by having OH-03 shedding some of it's least blue suburbs and instead taking in more of Downtown Columbus. However, Republicans might not want this cause they want the big banks of downtown Columbus to be in OH-15. Tbh, the main reason I reconfigured it is cause I wasn't up to dealing with those awful precicnts rn; if you use the same Franklin County config as is currently used, OH-15 basically stays the same.

[Torie]

In other news, this iteration is quite an effective Pubmander while hewing to all the right metrics, and would score very high under the Muon2 rules. Pity that apparently both the Pubs (at least some of the Pub politicians) and Mr. X would hate it.     One would think making Jim Jordan sweat like a pig hog would make it all worth it, but probably not. So sad. It's really quite fabulously gorgeous.

https://davesredistricting.org/join/247a02d0-0668-485c-904f-985a27ed4192

I like the map, but tbh that northeast OH config is pretty favorable to Dems; it keeps both OH-09 and OH-13 (renamed as OH-07 on your map) as competitive seats, in addition to creating 2 new competitive districts in Northeast OH (OH-08 and OH-14). I guess one could argue that trends in Northeast Ohio have generally been poor for Democrats, and that in time, all OH-07, OH-08, OH-09, and OH-14 will all become strongly R-leaning.

I would also be curious how much black population OH-14 takes from OH-11 here? Taking too many blacks out of OH-11 could make it less functional and be a VRA and/or 14th amendment violation.

I'm personally curious if the OH GOP would be willing to split Franklin County 3-ways? Both their original map and replacement map only split the County between 2 districts; one being the Dem pack nested entirely within the County and the other pairing the rest of the County with rurals. While you can make a decently R-leaning seat by pairing the rest of the County with deep red rurals, the only way to make a truly safe map would be to crack the County 3-ways.

Ofc the other big question is are Rs willing to just cede a Cinci seat to Dems at this point?

This exercise was about drawing the highest scoring map per the Muon2 rules, and see what one got. I think I did that. The maps are the highest scoring. Obviously, good looking maps can be drawn that zero out all the competitive districts, and leash the Dems to their three inner city cores.

Gingles is not in play. It's not possible to draw a Gingles CD anymore, and beyond that enough whites will vote for a black so the VRA does not apply anyway. Even if it did, OH-11 is black performing. A majority of Dem primary voters are Dem, and the whites in Shaker Heights, downtown, and around Case Western are used to voting for blacks.

Mr. X hates my Columbus act, but the law importunes to keep as much of Columbus in one CD, and I did that. It also minimizes the erosity, and within 99 residents, has a perfect nesting of all three CD's. Having either OH-12 or OH-15 take in all of the balance of Franklin, makes for an awkward map.

As to your map below, Mr. X thinks it will be Pub incumbent driven, and surely you can Pub up OH-13 in an aesthetic manner. What you did with OH-01 will test the limits of how hack the court will be, and the Pubs would be fools to go there. It poisons the whole map. What would be smart is screwing the Dems while having talking points that the screw was mere collateral damage for a map that accomplished other worthy goals. There was no bad intent.

You might provide a link to your map so that others can explore and mess with it.



Here is my Pub shut out map, ceding OH-01, that follows some of your cut throat tactics, that still has talking points to offer up to the Court as fig leaves for them to hide behind, no matter how disingenuous.

https://davesredistricting.org/join/b8f269b7-08eb-4491-81af-b00662d1667f



Here is another iteration.

https://davesredistricting.org/join/f8849bbb-4930-4afa-adb7-32a60238387d

[Vosem]

ProgressiveModerate's northeast Ohio configuration looks a lot like what I can imagine the Republicans ultimately adopting, but you drew Latta out of his seat, which he is unreasonably protective of, and you gave Wenstrup a much more competitive seat that I imagine he will fight like hell not to take. If the Hamilton County seat is going to move red, it's going to be placed with Warren, which it was with over the last decade, rather than with the counties to its immediate east, however much more 'clean' the latter plan seems to be.

[ProgressiveModerate]

In other news, this iteration is quite an effective Pubmander while hewing to all the right metrics, and would score very high under the Muon2 rules. Pity that apparently both the Pubs (at least some of the Pub politicians) and Mr. X would hate it.     One would think making Jim Jordan sweat like a pig hog would make it all worth it, but probably not. So sad. It's really quite fabulously gorgeous.

https://davesredistricting.org/join/247a02d0-0668-485c-904f-985a27ed4192

I like the map, but tbh that northeast OH config is pretty favorable to Dems; it keeps both OH-09 and OH-13 (renamed as OH-07 on your map) as competitive seats, in addition to creating 2 new competitive districts in Northeast OH (OH-08 and OH-14). I guess one could argue that trends in Northeast Ohio have generally been poor for Democrats, and that in time, all OH-07, OH-08, OH-09, and OH-14 will all become strongly R-leaning.

I would also be curious how much black population OH-14 takes from OH-11 here? Taking too many blacks out of OH-11 could make it less functional and be a VRA and/or 14th amendment violation.

I'm personally curious if the OH GOP would be willing to split Franklin County 3-ways? Both their original map and replacement map only split the County between 2 districts; one being the Dem pack nested entirely within the County and the other pairing the rest of the County with rurals. While you can make a decently R-leaning seat by pairing the rest of the County with deep red rurals, the only way to make a truly safe map would be to crack the County 3-ways.

Ofc the other big question is are Rs willing to just cede a Cinci seat to Dems at this point?

This exercise was about drawing the highest scoring map per the Muon2 rules, and see what one got. I think I did that. The maps are the highest scoring. Obviously, good looking maps can be drawn that zero out all the competitive districts, and leash the Dems to their three inner city cores.

Gingles is not in play. It's not possible to draw a Gingles CD anymore, and beyond that enough whites will vote for a black so the VRA does not apply anyway. Even if it did, OH-11 is black performing. A majority of Dem primary voters are Dem, and the whites in Shaker Heights, downtown, and around Case Western are used to voting for blacks.

Mr. X hates my Columbus act, but the law importunes to keep as much of Columbus in one CD, and I did that. It also minimizes the erosity, and within 99 residents, has a perfect nesting of all three CD's. Having either OH-12 or OH-15 take in all of the balance of Franklin, makes for an awkward map.

As to your map below, Mr. X thinks it will be Pub incumbent driven, and surely you can Pub up OH-13 in an aesthetic manner. What you did with OH-01 will test the limits of how hack the court will be, and the Pubs would be fools to go there. It poisons the whole map. What would be smart is screwing the Dems while having talking points that the screw was mere collateral damage for a map that accomplished other worthy goals. There was no bad intent.

You might provide a link to your map so that others can explore and mess with it.

Unfortunately, I played around with the map some more so don't have a link to that config I can give, though I didn't split precincts so one could probably come pretty close to recreating it if they really wanted too.

I agree your OH-11 would still be performing, but a court may take issue with a coherent black population still being cracked when keeping Cuyahoga blacks whole would only increase functionality of OH-11 and wouldn't be any sort of racial pack. It's also not like 14 would have enough blacks to be any type of "opportunity district" either, especially if the seat is R-leaning.

I like your second config quite a bit (in the sense it's an effective R-gerrymander). I agree to it's probably in the GOP's interest to not mess around with OH-01 at this point cause most legal configs risk failing at some point in the decade, and it makes the map more prone to legal attacks.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

ProgressiveModerate's northeast Ohio configuration looks a lot like what I can imagine the Republicans ultimately adopting, but you drew Latta out of his seat, which he is unreasonably protective of, and you gave Wenstrup a much more competitive seat that I imagine he will fight like hell not to take. If the Hamilton County seat is going to move red, it's going to be placed with Warren, which it was with over the last decade, rather than with the counties to its immediate east, however much more 'clean' the latter plan seems to be.

Actually, Wenstrup lives in Hillsboro in PM’s OH-2, so he’d be happy.  However, you’re right that Latta would scream bloody murder.  Beyond which, the map would be DOA anyway since it double-bunks Jim Jordan and Mike Carey.

[Oryxslayer]

Signature gathering has began to put a (actually) independent redistricting commission on the 2024 ballot.

[politicallefty]

Signature gathering has began to put a (actually) independent redistricting commission on the 2024 ballot.

It seems to be a variation of what we've seen in other states (such as California and Michigan), but with some minor differences. This is the text that was submitted (PDF). Interestingly, it includes a ranked choice vote for choosing a plan if the commission reaches an impasse. In other words, they must produce a map. It also requires an immediate redistricting of the state upon passage.

I'll withhold optimism though, because Ohio Republicans have successfully beat these back multiple times. If Bloomberg wants to put some money to good use, this would certainly be a good way to do so.

[ProgressiveModerate]

Signature gathering has began to put a (actually) independent redistricting commission on the 2024 ballot.

It seems to be a variation of what we've seen in other states (such as California and Michigan), but with some minor differences. This is the text that was submitted (PDF). Interestingly, it includes a ranked choice vote for choosing a plan if the commission reaches an impasse. In other words, they must produce a map. It also requires an immediate redistricting of the state upon passage.

I'll withhold optimism though, because Ohio Republicans have successfully beat these back multiple times. If Bloomberg wants to put some money to good use, this would certainly be a good way to do so.

Are there any tactics Republicans could realistically use to stop it from getting on the ballot? Or are you just saying that with the right campaign and messaging from Republicans, the ballot initiative could fail?

[politicallefty]

Signature gathering has began to put a (actually) independent redistricting commission on the 2024 ballot.

It seems to be a variation of what we've seen in other states (such as California and Michigan), but with some minor differences. This is the text that was submitted (PDF). Interestingly, it includes a ranked choice vote for choosing a plan if the commission reaches an impasse. In other words, they must produce a map. It also requires an immediate redistricting of the state upon passage.

I'll withhold optimism though, because Ohio Republicans have successfully beat these back multiple times. If Bloomberg wants to put some money to good use, this would certainly be a good way to do so.

Are there any tactics Republicans could realistically use to stop it from getting on the ballot? Or are you just saying that with the right campaign and messaging from Republicans, the ballot initiative could fail?

I think the most recent was a deal with the organizers of the petition. That's what led to the spectacular failure of the provisions that were in place for this recent round of redistricting. Otherwise, what I meant was that they've actually managed to beat it at the ballot. The 2005 measure did seem somewhat convoluted (and placed competitiveness as the primary and paramount factor for adopting a plan), but the 2012 measure also went down in flames.

[Oryxslayer]

Commission to meet September 13 to begin work on maps from 2022. There are a lot of moving parts here. Ohio does not have legal maps after the 2022 debacle, but they stretched things out until it was too late. The court lost the majority that kept ruling in favor of fairer maps in 2022, so any product would be accepted.  But the commission itself has changed. LaRose is fully in the public eye and can't lose more ground with primary voters. DeWine has made more statements against this type of commission with politicians involved.  Every legislative leader has changed. Most crucial to that fact that Speaker Jason Stephens supposedly made promises to the Dems concerning this redistricting when he got all their votes and defeated the majority of his caucus for said position.  

Then looming over everything is the petition currently collecting signatures. It crucially had provisions that order new maps to be immediately drawn following adoption (after potentially 2024) under the terms of the ammendment,  so that there isn't a multi-year delay between implementation and results.  Said initiative passing would render any and all work done this year less than worthless,  unless it is done to specifically preempt the voters.


All this is to say that while there are some since in favor of more understandable maps, or say sensible incumbent protection, there are a lot more unknowns.

[wbrocks67]

What are the odds that they just keep the 2022 maps in place?

[Oryxslayer]

What are the odds that they just keep the 2022 maps in place?

Also a very possible option. Certainly many states in similar (certainly not identical) positions in the past just rubber stamp their prior work. Texas had to do so for their legislative lines this year for example cause COVID prevented them from following the official timetable.

In my option, its less likely though since both the Dems and the Reps never wanted the present maps. But who knows, there's many unknowns.

[ProgressiveModerate]

What are the odds that they just keep the 2022 maps in place?

Unlikely for the reasons poster below stated, but I could def see them starting with it as the base map, and making some sort of deal that they'll cede Democrats OH-01 if Republicans get to shift OH-13 and maybe OH-09 rightwards. Even though at face value it seems competitive, I don't think Rs really touch OH-10 due to LaTurner's strengths and wants. OH-15 will also be interesting cause at face value it could be a liability, but Republicans were willing to draw it in it's current config to keep the downtown banks and other donors in OH-15.

Outside of possibly OH-01, I don't expect any part of the map to change in a way that favors Democrats.

The other option is that Republicans on the commission just go rutheless and go for a full 12-1-2 or even an attempted 13-2, but I'm more skeptical.

[politicallefty]

Shouldn't the Congressional lines be in effect for four years? Or is that part of the Ohio Constitution going to be conveniently ignored by the party that professes to abide by strict constructionism?

[Oryxslayer]

Shouldn't the Congressional lines be in effect for four years? Or is that part of the Ohio Constitution going to be conveniently ignored by the party that professes to abide by strict constructionism?

If I have it right, the lines are illegal based on the 2022 rulings, but there was no time to correct them. Of course the commission had been changimg and the court rejecting lines the whole year. So.under the ammendment,  they still need to pass a legal map before we talk about duration. 

[Minnesota Mike]

https://twitter.com/jpelzer/status/1699131071638691886

[Stuart98]

Don't they have to revisit this in two years regardless? What's the point here?

[politicallefty]

Don't they have to revisit this in two years regardless? What's the point here?

There's a proposal for a new redistricting amendment next year. Unfortunately, the map that's in place is the best possible map for 2024 consider the new hack majority on the Ohio Supreme Court.

[RussFeingoldWasRobbed]

X, Vosem Badger what do you guys think? Will the court allow this?

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

X, Vosem Badger what do you guys think? Will the court allow this?

Allow what?  A plaintiff can drop its lawsuit any time it wants; the Court has no say in that part.

[RussFeingoldWasRobbed]

X, Vosem Badger what do you guys think? Will the court allow this?

Allow what?  A plaintiff can drop its lawsuit any time it wants; the Court has no say in that part.

So does that mean the current map will remain in place I would assume?

[Progressive Pessimist]

If the current map does stay in place, I'd call that a relative win for Democrats. The map turned out better than expected for them in 2022. A redraw would have probably put that at risk and just created three Democratic vote sinks in the three C's.

[Vosem]

X, Vosem Badger what do you guys think? Will the court allow this?

Allow what?  A plaintiff can drop its lawsuit any time it wants; the Court has no say in that part.

So does that mean the current map will remain in place I would assume?

This particular lawsuit was an effort from Democratic-aligned groups to get the court to unilaterally adopt, or force the legislature to adopt, maps those groups would consider fairer. It was never very likely to succeed in its goals.

If the legislature does not redistrict, then the current maps will continue to be used. They have to redistrict for 2026 under the terms of Ohio's anti-gerrymandering rules, although my guess is that if they fail again then the courts would just use the current maps again.

Plaintiffs can always drop their suits if they wish. No court has any right to force anybody to continue suing someone.

[Arizona Iced Tea]

They will probably sink Cincy and make OH-13 redder. Kaptur is nearly 80, so they could just make that seat a few points redder and wait for her to retire.

[Oryxslayer]

Reminder that the 2024 Redistricting Amendment looms over anything and everything taking place right now. If that passes in the form it has been drafted, the body would immediately be constituted and remap everything within it's authority.