2020 Redistricting in Pennsylvania

[Oryxslayer]

Related question: How exactly does legislative redistricting work in PA?  I believe there is a commission formed with an equal number of members from both parties that historically always deadlocks and then the PA Supreme Court appoints a tiebreaker?  Historically, the process has resulted in de facto Republican control within certain limitations for at least the last 2 cycles.

The PA Supreme Court is currently 5D/2R and historically quite partisan.  4 of the 5 Dems are not up for retention election until at least 2025, so a Dem majority seems assured for the next redistricting cycle.  Does this mean to expect soft Dem control of the state legislative process after the 2020 census (again, within some significant constitutional limitations, similar to GOP control in FL or NC)?

Yes. However, my PA insider last summer suggested at least at that time that the GOP was willing to cut deals with dominant Dems to avoid the courts having sole authority on all maps. This would be a scenario with some hints of incumbent protection, but it would be protection limited by the natural barriers of geography. This would mean no absurd squiggles, and some weird local seats from last time have to be cut. However, this was last summer, things may have changed recently or could change in the 2020 elections.

[Oryxslayer]

Also it should be mentioned that one of the concrete parts of the rumor was that SWPA would be drawn to clean up what currently exists. Doyle, recognizing that his home was in a weird spot, would retire. This allows for a pure Pittsburgh+South Allegheny seat, which would be a 'gift' (to use the terms of my insider) to Lamb if he decides to stay at the congressional level. Then the present North Allegheny seat would be both open and pushed towards the center using the AA communities to the west of the city. It would essentially be drawn as a fair fight style seat. Butler of course is not going anywhere since that is Kelly's base - he actually wants the entire county reunified.

Something like what is shown below, but this is just my guess. Map just happens to be colored by 2018 Senate election.

[Oryxslayer]

If the goal is to preserve the present lean of the eastern seats, then something like this is the ideal alignment. Colors are from the 2016 presidential contest. PA06 remains a Clinton-favoring competitive seat, but nowhere to the degree it is presently. PA08 slides further to the right. Both are casualties of the fact that a Red seat is cut.



Note, this is not guided by rumors, it is just personal thoughts on if the present seats are to be maintained.

[Oryxslayer]

PA01: 50.1/48.7 Obama '12, 48.8/47.4 Clinton, 52.7/47.3 Toomey, 59./39.65 Wolf, 56.7/41.8 Casey

PA04: 57.1/41.8 Obama '12, 59.5/36.9 Clinton, 56.2/43.8 McGinty, 68.1/30.6 Wolf, 66.1/32.4 Casey

PA05: 58.8/40.2 Obama '12,  58.9/37.8 Clinton, 55.8/44.2 McGinty, 66.9/33.1 Wolf, 65.3/34.7 Casey

PA06: 50.2/48.5 Obama '12, 49.2/46.6 Clinton, 51.9/48.1 Toomey, 59.7/40.3 Wolf, 58/42 Casey

PA07: 54.4/44.4 Obama '12, 49.7/46.6 Clinton, 50.8/49.2 McGinty, 60.5/39.5 Wolf, 57.8/42.2 Casey

PA08: 52.4/46.2 Obama '12, 56.8/40.1 Trump, 53.7/46.3 Toomey, 53.6/46.4 Wolf, 50.9/49.1 Barletta

The other shown seats should speak for themselves. My data-set did not have indie votes except for presidential contests. The general theme, which should be obvious, is PA08 moves to the right of the state, PA07 is a bit to the  left, PA06 is moves right to left-of-center, and PA01 remains in it's current alignment.

[Oryxslayer]

It should be remembered that the PA GOP is ironically in a similar situation to the PA Dems last cycle. Both parties were/appear  willing to cut deals to prevent a worse outcome for their party. In both situations, the dominant party can ignore the opposition if she wishes, however they want to get a seat at the table to get what crumbs are available.

Now, the GOP is destined to get a larger slice of the pie than the Dems in 2010 got. However, the situation is similar in that if the minority refuses to cooperate, the dominant party can ignore them. So the dominant party will get what they want, but the Dems demands have to be far far less than the GOP's octopus-like districts from 2010. If the Dems don't like what the GOP is putting up, they will throw the maps to the courts and let them give the  state bluer lines. This trump card is a far weaker trump card than the what the GOP had in 2010, so the demands are less demanding and the concessions are more numerous. The GOP's goal in this is to know when to concede, so that their incumbents shuffled around. There is therefore  less 'trading' and more 'demands.'

If incumbent protection comes into play, than one demand may be a "triangle" seat in Central PA that protects PA06. It's probably the safest seat for the region that makes both geographic sense and keeps the rest of the regional preferences intact. It all depends  upon what happens in 2020 of course.

[Oryxslayer]

If incumbent protection comes into play, than one demand may be a "triangle" seat in Central PA that protects PA06. It's probably the safest seat for the region that makes both geographic sense and keeps the rest of the regional preferences intact. It all depends  upon what happens in 2020 of course.

The triangle seat is interesting, what are the election #s on that?

Also, I wonder if it might be possible to similarly have a Harrisburg-Reading-Lancaster triangle seat (alternatively to the more obvious possibility of a Harrisburg-York-Lancaster triangle seat, which IIRC there is probably not quite population for).

Harrisburg-York-Lancaster works, it was on one of the democrats proposed maps from last time, and the central PA region is growing the fastest when compared to the rest of the state. You just need to grab extra areas from the suburbs of Harrisburg to make it work out. Howver, such a seat complicates things the the west, and only really has a shot at existing if Democrats get a trifecta (lol) or if they take  the seat this year and put everything on keeping the seat blue in redistricting.

Harrisburg-Lancaster-Read doesn't work because it screws over SEPA and the seat has to pass through the densest parts of rural Lancaster county; the N/NW.  

This triangle is 52.6/43.1 Clinton. Fairly safe considering the blue bits of the seat are only getting bluer, as shown by the 2018 elections, in relation to the state baseline of course. In 2018 it was 62.2/37.8 Wolf (discounting indies), meaning that the seat was roughly 3-4% to the left of the state's baseline. McGinty even won this seat in 2016 as well, suggesting that the dem votes are rather solid here.

[Oryxslayer]

it should be noted that every post that I have made in these 2020 redistricting forums (excluding non-serious ones like hypotheticals or scenario-maps), are made using Occams Razor and Game Theory to deduce likely positions. This is why in GA I consistently see Bishop's seat getting carved up, because the GOP's position suggests this move. Here in PA, it's easy to see the Dems as being on top. The dems will make rational demands to protect their 2020 seats (dems may may gain or lose various seats here), demands that are rational within the confines of COI's, present districts, and all that. They do not have the luxury of holding a position that can ignore these more rational rules. The GOP can agree to those demands, at which point they and the dems can set about to working on the rest of the map so not to leave the republicans with nothing. Or the GOP can say no, and they get nothing as the maps are tossed upstairs to a court who appears to be happy to correct for the states geographic bias.

[Oryxslayer]

Aside from the obvious rule that states that each state must have the number of congressional districts laid down by the rules, is there a rule stating that each district must have a minimum electorate / population?

Districts must have the exact same population, or as close to exact as possible. This is accomplished by getting as close as possible to +1/-1/0 as you can with precincts, and then cutting precincts to achieve this outcome. This is all basic stuff in US Redistricting.

Now at the state level, there can be different provisions. Sometimes districts are allowed larger divergence in Pop, usually a +/-5%. This is often accompanied by a provision for county nesting, keeping NE towns intact, or something of that nature. This provision about exact population is why everyone fusses about COIs, since if this was Westminster style Redistricting, COIs would take the forefront and population equity gets sidelined.

[Oryxslayer]

Aside from the obvious rule that states that each state must have the number of congressional districts laid down by the rules, is there a rule stating that each district must have a minimum electorate / population?

For federal districts the rule is 1% variation.  The constitution does not specify this however, the supreme court justices acted as they are kings and ruled by decree. 

One man one Vote in the VRA actually makes this required/legal. Maybe not to the degree overseen by thee courts, but certainly required. This is a part of the VRA that has nothing to do with race, it had more  to do with the gross imbalances between districts of all sorts that existed before this piece of legislation. I happened to once have the fortune of looking at a congressional handbook on the districts (in a library) from that decade, and it is rather shocking how many states had to redraw  because they violated OMOV.

[Oryxslayer]

You can't split Bucks County!

Oh, really?

Yikes...

Well you can, it just that it hasn't since umm...has Bucks ever been cut to favor other counties? If you go way back you can find times that it had multiple seats in Bucks, but I'm not sure it has ever had to lend some of it's pop to other seats. Hell, before OMOV Bucks either was her own seat or was paired with one of her neighbors (Montgomery Lehigh), which may have been one of those 'overpopulated, but preserving local interests' districts. I stared at the GIS gif on this UCLA historical districts page for a good few minutes and never saw Bucks get cut.

So yes, while there are few absolutes in redistricting one of them is that PA will not cut Bucks, at least in 2020.

[Oryxslayer]

So I did a bit of playing around with the new population figures. Even with the lost CD, it's remarkable just how well things work oud. SEPA's growth when compared to the mass losses in the interior means that the region kept its districts where it matters. So here's how I think the seats that are not titanium GOP fall, assuming that the court will once again draw a map that corrects PA's geography for the Dems:

Lamb running statewide is a blessing in disguise, a blessing so prominent that I had heard rumors of Doyle retiring way back in 2018 if Lamb didn't go upwards. You now only have one Congressman from south and central Allegheny, which means there is no more need for Mt. Lebanon arm. Instead one can do a North-South cut loosely following the Ohio and Monongahela, giving the old PA17 all the towns north of White Oak. Old PA18 shifts rightwards, which gives you more breathing rom to add less Democratic areas but maintain the seats marginality. One of these additions will be the New Kensington area in Westmoreland, so that the old PA14 in Fayette-Greene-Washington-Westmorland-Somerset isn't overpopulated, and the the rest either can come from New Castle or Southern Butler like presently.

PA-10 has no need to change, pop in the South-Central towns meant it can get away with swapping around a few towns. Any larger changes would be the reunification of Cumberland and dropping a bit of rural York, or the Dem Gerry that added Lancaster to the seat - if it's not used elsewhere - in exchange for red turf.

The western seats fall in two general ways if one is looking to preserve the Democrats. It all revolves around Chester and Bucks: Chester and PA-06 are fine but her confined Delaware neighbor is not, and Bucks has lot dropping in share of the overall SEPA population.

-If we approach this thing from the perspective of preserving the present PA-06, here's how things rotate. PA-05 remains a Delaware seat, takes in the Montgomery and Philadelphia surplus's, but still needs 1-2 townships from Chester that are available to give. Lack of pop to the west means Bucks must go North and take in towns south of the Lehigh river in the two northern counties. PA-07 grabs all of Monroe, and PA-08 slides towards the GOP.

-Here's how things fall if we take the aim of preserving PA-01. The county can take all the necessary pop it needs from Philadelphia and Montgomery, but there is some remainder. PA-05 goes westwards into Chester. PA-06, if we assume a Dem favoring map, becomes a triangle district. The Main Line and US30 corridor another one end, Reading another, and Lancaster the final corner. PA-07 is flexible and could grab the remainder from Montgomery in Pottstown if it drops some north county suburbs for PA-08, could maintain it's present arrangement, can eat north Bucks so that Bucks takes the surplus, etc. Either way, this preserves PA-08's present GOP lean, and could get more Dem if it gets all of the Monroe.

[Oryxslayer]

I don't think really anyone should be thinking about adding the north Part of Berks to any of the SEPA seats, unless Berks is becoming the anchor for a new district. That area has more in common with the post-industrial areas to her north and it doesn't exactly work to the Dems advantage like one assumes the court will prefer.



If one is looking to preserve the whole-Chester PA-06, then you shouldn't have to send PA-04 any more northwards than presently, and these cuts as shown can be swapped for a PA-05 cut into Chester which is then cycled through back to Berks through PA-06. It's a county that can anchor a full district. The burden instead should fall on PA-01 who needs the pop, and there is a fairly natural arrangement below the Lehigh river.



Adding Democratic Kutztown and the entirety of Monroe basically fills out PA-07, with the rest coming naturally from the excess of PA-08 under these lines. Downside is that under these lines PA-08 basically becomes a GOP flip, if not in 2022 definitely later down the line, which might prompt the court to use Lancaster for PA-10 to counteract the movement - if they go for this style of alignment.

[Oryxslayer]

https://twitter.com/timelywriter/status/1440332356578013193?s=20

This panel is effectively 3D/2R because the State Supreme Court (partisan elections, 5D/2R) appoints the tiebreaker, right?

Yeah State leg panel is D, so those maps are changing a lot. Cong doesn't use this but we all expect maps to get kicked upwards anyway.

[Oryxslayer]

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)

I'd rather have a Biden won Dem trending PA-10 than trying to save Cartwright.

See this post for how to do that. If you are willing to chuck Cartwright by putting all of Monroe in PA-07, then you can more or less keep the core of every SEPA seat. And if you are cutting one dem seat, why not create another in SCPA with the three cities?

Arguably, that's what I think people don't realize. The court is dem leaning, and knows the western seats need to take in more turf cause a seat got cut - raising the overall threshold. The biggest basket of unused Dem votes available to add to those seats, to preserve the topline partisan equitability (will be a desire) is to use Lancaster, either in PA-06 or PA-10.

[Oryxslayer]

For reference, here's what I expect in Pittsburgh. With Lamb gone, everything becomes much neater. The trick is you no longer need to stick Mt. Lebanon in PA-17. Sure it's a very Liberal suburb, but to it's south and west are areas with non-negligible numbers of Republicans. If you want to keep a swing seat in the region - which is gonna be the goal, the easiest way is to get the east towns with substantial AA populations. From there you can add bits and pieces totaling 78K from each of the surrounding three colors to green. This produces a seat that voted from Trump and Wolf, like the present seat, but by margins slightly more favorable for the Democrats.

Oh, and this PA-17 Pittsburgh seat has a div of 2 people, despite cutting no towns or precincts.

[Oryxslayer]

With both Doyle and Lamb out, its almost guaranteed that the Pittsburgh region will maintain it's current alignment with 1 D-leaning swing and one safe - or get better for Dems. No incumbents anymore to worry about, so only statewide partisan concerns need matter.

[Oryxslayer]

I am once again asking people to recognize that with both Lamb and Doyle out, there is no longer any need to preserve the ugly current PA-17 Pittsburgh reach-around. Just grab all of the Penn hills region to the west of the city and use the rivers as guidelines for district borders. This near-guarantees a Biden seat, one that could even be more Democratic than the nation if you know what you are aiming for.

[Oryxslayer]

I am once again asking people to recognize that with both Lamb and Doyle out, there is no longer any need to preserve the ugly current PA-17 Pittsburgh reach-around. Just grab all of the Penn hills region to the west of the city and use the rivers as guidelines for district borders. This near-guarantees a Biden seat, one that could even be more Democratic than the nation if you know what you are aiming for.

Problem is Rs controlling the state legislature would have a collective stroke if Allegheny is drawn too unfavorably to them.

We know the map is either going to the D courts or end up a D-favoring compromise (that'll leave their seats intact and favorable) because the D's used said court as leverage and got a map they liked, so why do they matter? In the latter scenario the R's would care more about securing their own then spending little capital on offense, and the courts in the former clearly wanted to do it in 2018 except Lamb lived in Mt. Lebanon and Doyle had a base in the Swissvale area.

[Oryxslayer]

I am once again asking people to recognize that with both Lamb and Doyle out, there is no longer any need to preserve the ugly current PA-17 Pittsburgh reach-around. Just grab all of the Penn hills region to the west of the city and use the rivers as guidelines for district borders. This near-guarantees a Biden seat, one that could even be more Democratic than the nation if you know what you are aiming for.

Problem is Rs controlling the state legislature would have a collective stroke if Allegheny is drawn too unfavorably to them.

We know the map is either going to the D courts or end up a D-favoring compromise (that'll leave their seats intact and favorable) because the D's used said court as leverage and got a map they liked, so why do they matter? In the latter scenario the R's would care more about securing their own then spending little capital on offense, and the courts in the former clearly wanted to do it in 2018 except Lamb lived in Mt. Lebanon and Doyle had a base in the Swissvale area.

Didn't they draw the 6D/5 swing/7 R map before the special election Lamb won or am I misremembering? Either way as hard as it is to believe 6D/5 swing/6R is D-leaning considering how f---ed the geography of the state is (inb4 "land doesn't vote!" Sorry, we've already decided property >>>> life in this country.) Any more and Rs prolly strip the 5-2 Court of the authority to appoint the tie-breaker to the commission at the first opportunity.

Granted, knowing the um... authoritarian the PAGOP has taken they'll prolly do that anyway whenever they take back the governor's mansion so maybe you're right after all.

The commission is only for legislative lines. Congressional districts are a bill that (likely will not) pass the chamber and the governor's pen, which is why an outside authority will be needed - the same court as last time. And said court last time took steps to correct for the state's geographic lean, which means a mild D-favoring map.

TBH I don't like 'corrective mapping' like this in fair Congressional lines, cause various statewide geographic advantages and the VRA work to cancel out any real political benefit nationwide, so one does not need to correct in a single state. But that is not the rules we play by, and that is not the rules the PA court recognized in 2018.  

[Oryxslayer]

I think what might happen is an 8-8 map with one competitive seat, or an 8-8 map with one right-leaning district.

This is actually a rather hard outcome given the state's geography and the pre-envisioned communities that base said seats. Any Bucks-anchored seat is going to be marginal, same with any Lehigh Valley seat, and the second Alleghany-based successor seat to PA-17 will be marginal unless Pittsburgh is cracked for some reason.

[Oryxslayer]

Well this map is totally gonna survive a trip through the courts.  Uh-huh.  Yup.

😂😂😂

Sadly though, I have zero doubt that the Commonwealth Court will try to stall out the appeal so that this upcoming election is run under these maps.  Which likely means the GOP picks up Lamb’s open seat and knocks off Cartwright, Houlahan, and Wild, for a 12R/5D delegation.

I don't think this is possible. Tom Wolf will probably veto it and punt it to the PASC.

Wolf will 100% veto, so if it gets through the Commonwealth Court before the filing deadline in early March, then yeah, we should end up with a fair map, because the PASC is relatively well versed in mapping at this point.

I mean it'll have to, cause with Wolf's veto there probably will be no congressional plan in place for said elections. With that in mind, this map has just as much chance of becoming electoral reality as the plans drawn by forum users.

[Oryxslayer]

Lol the GOPers failed at making a good mander. You could draw something prettier that is more of a mander.

I think its more the case they want to claim some bit of the high ground in preparation for the court fight. This map isn't expected to be passed and therefore doesn't reflect incumbent or partisan concerns, it instead is a friendly map from a favorable 2018 plaintiff. The goal is to show they are listening to concerns previously expressed and are somewhat 'reasonable.'

[Oryxslayer]

GOP House passes their own congressional map. Despite all the twists and turns, we are still on track for the veto into court-appointed master that was the expectation going in.

[Oryxslayer]

https://mobile.twitter.com/sarahnferris/status/1481795943079063555

Procedural although perhaps increases the chances Democrats come to to the table on a compromise map

Also important to note this is a separate legal case that began last year - not the extraordinary circumstance that is expected to arise. There will almost certainly be a legislative impasse, making the supreme court automatically the backstop.

[Oryxslayer]

After a brief analysis, the haphazard way the map was drawn when it comes to the finer points but the instant clarity when it comes to the broader ones suggests the only purpose of this map is to provide justification for a veto. But maybe I'm wrong.