2020 Census and Redistricting Thread: Louisiana

[chalmetteowl]

My attempt at creating a state Senate fair map. I am almost completely sure I didn't include enough VRA districts but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Interestingly my map ended with many competitive districts despite Louisiana being a very inelastic state



https://davesredistricting.org/join/f289c3a9-53e5-42c4-b1b1-26a0b68e92af

There should be 9 Safe D districts, 6 competitive districts and 24 Safe R districts.

Tipping point districts are district 7 (Trump+24, R+16; Located western Jefferson parish and northeastern St. Charles parish) and district 18 (covers south Baton Rouge and a tiny bit of Iberville parish)

After the veto session we just had, I’m wondering what’s the most Republican you can get the State House and State Senate… Republicans have a veto proof majority if they can keep all of their votes, but I wonder if new maps can stack it even further in our legislature, like 80-25 in the House and 30-9 in the Senate

[chalmetteowl]

My attempt at creating a state Senate fair map. I am almost completely sure I didn't include enough VRA districts but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Interestingly my map ended with many competitive districts despite Louisiana being a very inelastic state



https://davesredistricting.org/join/f289c3a9-53e5-42c4-b1b1-26a0b68e92af

There should be 9 Safe D districts, 6 competitive districts and 24 Safe R districts.

Tipping point districts are district 7 (Trump+24, R+16; Located western Jefferson parish and northeastern St. Charles parish) and district 18 (covers south Baton Rouge and a tiny bit of Iberville parish)

After the veto session we just had, I’m wondering what’s the most Republican you can get the State House and State Senate… Republicans have a veto proof majority if they can keep all of their votes, but I wonder if new maps can stack it even further in our legislature, like 80-25 in the House and 30-9 in the Senate

They would have to start messing with black majority districts to get Democrats that low.

i'm not sure if those are still required or what the minimum number of such Louisiana needs to have

A VRA district is not legally required unless the relevant minority group can make up 50% or more of the district’s voting-age population (VAP).¹ More specifically, the question is whether the relevant minority can constitute more than 50% of the citizen voting-age population (CVAP).

the way i read it you could draw a bunch of districts that are 40% black and no such VRA district is legally required

[chalmetteowl]

here is an article from the Hayride about the politics behind the redistricting process

https://thehayride.com/2021/07/heres-what-larry-sabato-says-about-congressional-redistricting-in-louisiana/

[chalmetteowl]

Edwards came from Amite, which is in my LA-06.

i keep on saying: the only D who can win in LA other than the VRA house district is Edwards, and he shouldn't waste his time on a House seat when he can challenge for Cassidy's seat in 2026

[chalmetteowl]

Edwards came from Amite, which is in my LA-06.

i keep on saying: the only D who can win in LA other than the VRA house district is Edwards, and he shouldn't waste his time on a House seat when he can challenge for Cassidy's seat in 2026

Lol.
If Edwards is dumb enough to think he could win a senate race statewide...I don’t know what to say.

he just won governor statewide twice, and Cassidy voted guilty on Trump's second impeachment.

now if it's anyone else but Cassidy, he doesn't have a shot

[chalmetteowl]

Are we going to see a trend where Democrats increasingly have geographical advantages in the Deep South?

i wouldn't think there would be any advantage when both parties are packed similarly. it depends on who draws the maps

they can be centered in cities and fan out (New Orleans could have three different Democrat House members who win close races in swingy districts) or be bigger in size and just dip into the cities (New Orleans could have 0 Democrat House members, each losing close races to suburban R members)

[chalmetteowl]

I can’t remember the answer, but do Republicans have veto override numbers on JBE? If not, I bet he could hold off for a competitive 2nd Dem district.

i kind of hope LA Republicans can trade a 4R-2D map for even bigger supermajorities in the legislature that would require more defections to derail Republican priorities. We had the veto session recently and R's didn't accomplish what they came there to do because some were claiming dubious travel restrictions due to curiously timed knee surgery, etc. as the Republican speaker of the state house publicly admitted he didn't want to do his job and whip votes. Those overrides failed by like one or two votes and JBE and the Democrats gloated.

[chalmetteowl]

https://louisiana.redistrictingandyou.org/?districtType=cd&propA=current_2011&propB=congress_chrishenry1_20220104#%26map=6.4/31.25/-91.848

wanted to add this link, which has plans for LA House, Senate, and Congressional districts

[chalmetteowl]

Could there be an argument that any 50%+ BVAP LA-02 violates neutral redistricting principles given in a nonracially drawn compact and fair map, the New Orleans area would just get it's own dedicated seat rather than attaching black rurals to boost black population? Honestly for the GOP no matter what happens with VRA New Orleans is likely too hard to politically crack down the middle given balancing a bunch of Trump + 17 seats is bound to make someone upset.

That is another issue that is not entirely clear. Is a 50% BVAP CD but no more a safe harbor if sufficiently compact to trigger Gingles, or is one obligated to follow neutral redistricting principles that have a lower BVAP percentage, so long as it is black performing? The legal answer is probably the former safe harbor one, but I think there is some doubt. As a matter of policy, one should of course try to hew to neutral redistricting  as much as one can while preserving a minority performing CD that is Gingles protected. I think it is pretty clear at the moment that the compact standard for Gingles is looser than the one used for purposes of neutral redistricting principles. The issue is how much looser. One hopes SCOTUS will elaborate.

Exactly. I feel like there's ways to go about it that are better than others, and as tricky as it may be, I'd really be happy with the SCOTUS if they come up with some sort of purely mathematical benchmark even if it otherwise loosens things up a bit.

Also I'd argue the arbitrary strandard for 50% black districts by default violates fair redistricting principles cause ina truly natural map, you should have some 40% black seats and some 60% black seats; not just a bunch of 50% black seats and then a bunch of whiter seats.

Like I kinda feel like black communities should as much as possible be left whole, but aiming for a specific 50% standard doesn't make sense when some of those seats would've already been perfoming at 30% black and others would still be iffy at 50%.

Inherently too, just aiming for black functioning districts eliminates political competition in primaries as well. In fair maps, shouldn't all races ahve opportunities to expand or shrink their coalition if that makes sense rather then deadlock 2 black reps and 4 white representatives for example

As an intellectual [a masturbatory] exercise, I pretended as to dividing the real estate between LA-01 and LA-02, I would forget about everything except compactness, chops (parish and municipal), and beauty.

I came up with the below. Is LA-02 black performing? Yes, I think so to at least close to a reasonable doubt. Is LA-01 still rock solid Pub? Yes? Will it ever be drawn? No. Part of the reason is that some of the whites placed in LA-02 in this iteration are some of the most virulent racists in the US. It has issues as to soft COI issues as I refer to them, and I am a pretty hard liner when it comes to blowing off soft COI claims.  

Btw, LA has no land contiguity requirement for darn good reasons!  

https://davesredistricting.org/join/bc9408f5-7d21-4cd6-bbe9-f4425e68ec06

That's also part of the problem too. There really can't be any rule between "racist" and "nonracist" whites for obvious reasons, though one can argue "racist" whites help make LA-02  amore reliable black functioning seat cause they most likely vote in the R primary.

Also just in general in the South, most "whites" are racist in the sense they don't share the same political interests as black folks. There are very few liberal whites in the South generally so no matter what a district will either be a black pack or include whites who vote opposite to how blacks vote.

there is no such thing as an R or D primary in LA. All candidates run in the open primary and if the winner gets 50% +1, they're elected. if no candidate does, there's a runoff between the top 2.