2020 Redistricting in Pennsylvania

[Libertas Vel Mors]

If PA Dems want to replace Boyle with Street, it's pretty easy to make both Philly districts Black influence without all the other ugliness (and honestly they should--pretty messed up currently to be honest).

Well that would mean outer Montco goes with Berks making a swing seat. It seems the main goal is more to protect Houlahan while giving up Lambs seat(which would sorta happen anyway in a fair map but with certain preferences from Mike Kelly.) However in exchange for those preferences they place Indiana college instead to keep it at the same partisan level.  After that Perry just gets to stay secure.

Also Fitz gets a marginally better district I guess but the shift is quite small.

Not necessarily:



link

Houlahan gets a 51-44 Clinton district. The purple district is plurality Black VAP at 36%, while the green is 47% (and an outright majority on total population.) I mixed up the numbering on the Philly districts accidentally, my bad.



link

This one is better at both shoring up Houlahan (53-42 Clinton) and increasing BVAP in the both Philly districts (38% in Green and 48% in Purple). It is more of a shakeup though.

Why use Clinton numbers when there's 2020 data?

[Libertas Vel Mors]

Changes from 2020

PA-01: Biden +5.8 to Biden +4.6
PA-02: Biden +41.0 to Biden +42.7
PA-03: Biden +83.2 to Biden +80.9
PA-04: Biden +24.1 to Biden +18.9
PA-05: Biden +31.1 to Biden +32.3
PA-06: Biden +15.0 to Biden +14.8
PA-07: Biden +4.8 to Biden +0.6
PA-08: Trump +4.4 to Trump +2.9
PA-10: Trump +2.9 to Trump +4.1

Good for PA-08 but crappy for PA-07, while Dean is losing a chunk of Dems - where did they go? Are those the ones going to PA-05? Because that district is only 1% more Dem.

PA-01 and PA-10 kinda suck. Little to no chance that Dems can get those back even in a good year at this point with Fitz and now that PA-10 is more GOP and Perry won more than Trump in 2020.

You forgot the most important change, R's lose an entire seat yet 3/4 Dem swing seats get shored up.

Right, but the GOP should lose a seat. They have the most population loss and they lost the state in 2020.

That was always agreed upon since the begining of this cycle. The Democratic seats still needed to pick up 300k in population of blood red territory. Considering 3/4 swing seats for Democrats got shored up despite that, that's a swell courtmander they got.

https://davesredistricting.org/maps#viewmap::48bc041f-ff25-42bc-a74d-d90f325dde0e

Look at Palandios map. Democrats gain like 14 points from PA17 moving it from somewhere around Trump +8 to Biden +6. They gain like 10 points for PA06 with the tri chop of Berks to drown it out with Montgomery and Chester. . That's a whole 25 points worth gained in swing districts .

It's a neutral map in wbrock67's alternate reality where Biden actually won PA by 9.

Huh? What the f**k are you actually talking about? Biden won Pennsylvania. It's a 9-8 Biden map. Biden won PA slightly. The map has a slight Biden won edge. How is that objectionable? This is literally what a fair map looks like. If Trump won PA slightly, then you'd expect it to be a 9-8 Trump map. How are people actually having an issue with this?!

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. A fair map would be 9-5-3, like this. https://davesredistricting.org/maps#viewmap::1aec4a7c-782d-4214-82ac-1a0e16a04cb7

[Libertas Vel Mors]

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. A fair map would be 9-5-3, like this. https://davesredistricting.org/maps#viewmap::1aec4a7c-782d-4214-82ac-1a0e16a04cb7

Only they really aren't all that self-packed.   You split up the Harrisburg metro, have a district stretching from Pike to Snyder, that PA-16 district in Allegheny makes no sense at all, and drew the Chester district in an almost optimal way for Republicans.   That's not a neutral map at all.

The PA-16 definitely makes sense. It's the suburbs of Alleghany after PA-17 is drawn. The Chester district includes blue Reading, and it's the most logical way to draw the district after keeping Bucks whole and drawing a Montgomery County only district. The Harrisburg has the most optimal split: my map avoids splitting York and Lancaster counties, which have more population than Harrisburg, but even if you prioritize keep Harrisburg whole (little real reason to do so) that's still a Trump district. Same for Scranton/PA-08 and PA-09: my configuration avoids county splits, but even if you want to draw it in a more Dem-friendly way it's still a Trump seat.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

Sure it's still a Trump seat but theres a huge difference between a Trump +18 and a Trump +3 seat especially in that area. Come on man. Your Chesco split is probably a few points R favorable as well. SCPA is pretty weird so I can forgive most stuff in the area but that's just yuck. Sure Dauphin is 300k vs York and Lancaster being a majority but Dauphin + Eastern Cumberland is like 500k

I mean, sure, but my main response was the justification for the split. Giving York and Lancaster their own seats is more important. And I don't see how my Chesco split is R favorable, but glad to see other maps if you prefer others.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

I really hope there’s some kind of minor change in coalitions that allows some of the artificial D seats in PA, OH, NC, MI, etc to go red. I’m not sure how that would happen but it would be hilarious. The self-righteous D’s on this forum would very much deserve it for how much they are celebrating hideously gerrymandered seats in the name of partisan fairness. I’m not sure why the courts ever got this idea but the maps are intended to preserve communities of interest so that their geographical area can fairly select a representative. They are not supposed to legislate the national scoreboard and pre-determine who wins each seat.

I don't even think it has to be minor. By the end of the decade, I expect at least two of the Michigan seats to be R (the Flint and Lansing seats), and two of the PA seats (Scranton + Lehigh Valley).

[Libertas Vel Mors]

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.

It is self packing that Democratic vote shares are highly concentrated in urban areas.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

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.

It is self packing that Democratic vote shares are highly concentrated in urban areas.

Republicans are heavily concentrated in rural areas....do you penalize them for that?

Excluding some rare rural packs, Republicans are less concentrated in rural areas than Dems in urban areas.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

Some of you are getting way too in the weeds. A fair map is one that reflects partisanship of the state. Doesn't matter how it got there. At the end of the day a Biden 9-8 map that includes a few very competitive districts IS a fair map. If anything, you could even argue that it favors Rs a bit since even though Biden won some of those districts, they are more R by PVI

Nope. It literally does not matter whether it reflects the partisanship of the state. A fair map is one that reflect the communities of interest of the state. We have a fundamental definitional disagreement of what a fair map is.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

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.

It is self packing that Democratic vote shares are highly concentrated in urban areas.

Republicans are heavily concentrated in rural areas....do you penalize them for that?

Excluding some rare rural packs, Republicans are less concentrated in rural areas than Dems in urban areas.

To elaborate on this, I'd say that Republicans are hurt by rural self-packing versus their proportional % in Iowa, and they are (to some extent, defining a fair TX map is weird) by rural self-packing and non-citizens giving Dems greater voting power in TX. Arguably, NV is also an example of this although to a lesser extent. There are some states like UT where Republicans are also highly packed in certain areas, but Republicans getting non-insane but still high margins in the rest of the Wasatach Front there means that Dems only get 1/4 of the natural seats. CA may also be an example but I'm not sure, like TX defining a fair CA map can be weird because there are so many districts.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

Some of you are getting way too in the weeds. A fair map is one that reflects partisanship of the state. Doesn't matter how it got there. At the end of the day a Biden 9-8 map that includes a few very competitive districts IS a fair map. If anything, you could even argue that it favors Rs a bit since even though Biden won some of those districts, they are more R by PVI

Nope. It literally does not matter whether it reflects the partisanship of the state. A fair map is one that reflect the communities of interest of the state. We have a fundamental definitional disagreement of what a fair map is.

A 9-0 map of Massachusetts is fair even if Republicans proportionally "deserve" 3 (separately, of course, from the fact that it's impossible to give Republicans 3 Massachusetts seats. A map like this decade's that gives Democrats 100% of the NH seats is fair even if Republicans proportionally "deserve" 1. Etc etc.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

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.

It is self packing that Democratic vote shares are highly concentrated in urban areas.

Republicans are heavily concentrated in rural areas....do you penalize them for that?

Excluding some rare rural packs, Republicans are less concentrated in rural areas than Dems in urban areas.

Less concentrated doesn't mean not concentrated at all,  they should still be penalized like you seem to want to penalize Democrats.

This isn't about penalizing. It's about communities of interest. In a state like Pennsylvania, Republicans are "penalized" because a fair map draws a bunch of deep red districts in Central PA. It's just that those districts are less relatively red than the deep blue urban districts are blue, and that there's fewer of them.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

Some of you are getting way too in the weeds. A fair map is one that reflects partisanship of the state. Doesn't matter how it got there. At the end of the day a Biden 9-8 map that includes a few very competitive districts IS a fair map. If anything, you could even argue that it favors Rs a bit since even though Biden won some of those districts, they are more R by PVI

Nope. It literally does not matter whether it reflects the partisanship of the state. A fair map is one that reflect the communities of interest of the state. We have a fundamental definitional disagreement of what a fair map is.

So if you have a state that has a huge city and smaller communities, but then only 1 district for that city and then say, 3-4 districts for those smaller communities, a map that is 3-1 or 4-1 for a state that could be equal in partisanship is fair? That makes no sense.

Nope, it totally makes sense. And yep, that seems perfectly fair.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

I'm begging you all to remember, the PASC did not draw this map. It was one of 15 proposals submitted by various plaintiffs, including both Democratic and Republican groups.

If you want to argue that the chosen map is unfair, you should be prepared to defend why one of the other submissions was better. Because I would argue that while the adopted plan deviates from a partisan-blind definition of fairness in the Pittsburgh area, all of the other proposals had aspects that were worse - whether it be splitting the Wilkes-Barre area, splitting the Harrisburg area, excessive county splits, or other problems.

Republicans had every opportunity to propose a fair map, but they did not. They have no one but themselves to blame for the outcome.

I don't think any of the submissions were fair.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

If you were to rank the options in SCPA from most Dem-friendly to most R-friendly, it would be:

Harrisburg, Lancaster, and York in the same district
Harrisburg and Lancaster together, York separate
Harrisburg and York together, Lancaster separate
Lancaster and York together, Harrisburg separate
Harrisburg, Lancaster, and York all separate

So in a sense, Harrisburg-York is the median choice.

HCY in one district would be absurd lol, it's not a real option.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

If you were to rank the options in SCPA from most Dem-friendly to most R-friendly, it would be:

Harrisburg, Lancaster, and York in the same district
Harrisburg and Lancaster together, York separate
Harrisburg and York together, Lancaster separate
Lancaster and York together, Harrisburg separate
Harrisburg, Lancaster, and York all separate

So in a sense, Harrisburg-York is the median choice.

HCY in one district would be absurd lol, it's not a real option.

Not more absurd than some of the GOP's proposed maps. You can do it with minimal county splits, and you can make a COI argument for grouping cities together.

You can't draw them all together without either making the district non-compact or splitting the Harrisburg metro.