Gotham and Metropolis are the two most well-known fictional cities from the DC Comics Universe. They represent a perfect binary, with Metropolis as the growing, safe, and happy city while Gotham is shrinking, dangerous, and depressing. Metropolis fits the idealistic Superman while Gotham fits the cynical Batman. Normally, they even put Gotham and Metropolis right next to each other, such as in this map:
I always wondered how the presence of Gotham and Metropolis affected the politics of the states that the cities existed in, and with the United States at large. Population ranges from a few million to almost as large as NYC for both cities, so depending on how large you accept their populations to be, their impacts would be massive. I personally envision Metropolis as having two million with Gotham having 1.5 million, to make things more realistic. Regardless, Metropolis greatly impacts Delaware, definitely turning the state from a one congressional district state to a multiple one, and Wilmington is no longer the largest city in the state. Gotham makes southern New Jersey more populous, and only greatly affects the CD count depending on how massive the city's population is. NJ has 14 CDs OTL, so the jump is not too massive.
In order to keep the House of 435 seats, which states would lose populations to Delaware and New Jersey here? With another big city in NJ, is Christie still Governor? Is Joe Biden more prominent because of a more prominent Delaware? How have recent Senate races changed? Would the EV rearrangement cause a significant change in certain close elections such as 2000? How would both cities vote in general, for both primaries and general elections? Are Metropolis and Gotham atypical for big cities and more likely to vote Republican than other urban centers, or do they further cement Delaware and New Jersey as Democratic states? What else would become of the existence of these two cities for American politics?
