US House Redistricting: New York

[cinyc]

That map is very well done, Mike - considerably better than the maps the Pubs submitted, even though yours is a quite Pub friendly map obviously. Did you find it as difficult as I to find a good map of the town lines in Nassau County (clearly you did find such a map)? (Nassau has 3 towns and 2 cities, the rest being villages, I now find out.) The towns do not appear on the DRA maps.

Newsday's DRA-like mapper has a layer that shows town lines instead of villages and whatever else DRA uses (census designated areas, perhaps).

The Plaintiffs and other parties would have made the same argument about muon2's map as they did Common Cause's - it pits incumbents against each other and is not a least change map from current lines.  It also doesn't have exact population equality (in this case, largely due to limitations in the DRA software).  The racial grievance groups would have attacked the map because it eliminates the awful NY-12, putting Chinatown and Sunset Park in separate districts, diluting the Chinese vote.  That seems to be a big bugaboo with the Asian legal defense group.

Too bad muon2 missed the deadline.  The order wanted public submissions to include a block equivalency file.  Does DRA even do that? 

[cinyc]

Any map that preserves the earmuffs and makes them even more urban is a gerry, IMO. Those suburban towns in Monroe County you shed in order to make it more of a D vote sink include Louise Slaughter's home town of Fairport.

The court is likely to draw a least-change map, meaining the earmuffs might actually end up staying.

[cinyc]

There was a hearing today.  According to the Albany Times-Union, the judge seemed largely interested in to what extent she should take incumbency into account when drawing her map.  The judge's map should be released by next Monday.

[cinyc]

Buffalo and Rochester are very different cities with different economies and politics. That would be like linking Raleigh-Durham and Winston-Salem, or saying Baltimore and Washington D.C. are basically the same. Rochester is built on knowledge industries and engineering while Buffalo is rust belt.

Parts of Buffalo and Rochester are currently in the same congressional district.  Legislators thought them sufficiently similar to include in the same district in 2002.  If the judge goes with a least-change map, they might still be linked in the same district, ugliness notwithstanding.

[cinyc]

The application of the least change rules, where the number of CD's is changed, may be a case of first impression. And I am not sure if for federal courts, it is mandatory or not in any event. And does it matter whether the old map was a bipartisan one (albeit a bipartisan gerrymander), which it was in NY, or a one party partisan gerrymander, in which event, that one party gerrymander would go on forever unless the other party captured the power trifecta, or it got into state court. Just how things end up in federal or state court is another mystery.

Well, the main argument that the parties are having is over whether the magistrate judge need to take incumbency into account, with the political parties arguing she must because the legislature usually has done so and Common Cause and some intervenors arguing that she need not because the NYS Constitution and law does not include incumbency protection as a factor and the legislature hasn't passed a map.  A second argument made by Plaintiff-Intervenors is that the map should be a least-change one, meaning the Common Cause map should be thrown out.

FWIW, the expert university professor special master here was the special master in the Connecticut Supreme Court's recent redistricting case, which ultimately resulted in a least-change map.  Here, he was proposed by the Democrats and clerked for a Democrat appointed federal judge.   The magistrate is a Clinton appointee.

Today, the judge ordered LATFOR to send a shapefile with the current CDs along with a file showing racial density in those districts for all 4 groups.

[cinyc]

Here's the only question worth asking, folks - do the State Senate Republicans get a Senate map where they still have a good opportunity at holding the majority.  If so, then these will be the maps, for 2012 at least.

Does the same special master draw the State Lege now or will that be separate?

As of right now, the special master isn't drawing the State Legislature maps.  They are going through a second draft at the legislative level.  Governor Cuomo has threatened to veto them unless done in a nonpartisan manner, which these maps clearly are not.  But he might let them pass if he gets a constitutional amendment to make redistricting non-partisan in the future as part of the bargain.  

The gerrymandering in the state plans is superb.  If gerrymandering were an art, the State Senate plan would be a classic.  It continues the overrepresentation of Upstate and breaks up areas in Westchester and Long Island in order to keep or make Republican seats.  The Assembly map is not as blatant, but still a good job of gerrymandering.

The first draft of the state maps are here:
http://www.latfor.state.ny.us/maps/

[cinyc]

Numbers were crunched on DKE.

Kind of a crappy map for the Democrats. The immediate casualties are split (Hochul and the Hincheymander for the Dems, Turner and Buerkle for the Republicans), but it puts Israel and McCarthy in marginal (albeit Dem-leaning) districts. Yes, it does improve the Dem performance in most of the upstate districts held by Republicans, but it's not enough to hurt any of them except for Gibson and maybe Hayworth. Plus it doesn't help out Owens at all.

Buerkle got the best district possible that she could hope for if you keep Onondaga County together, especially considering that the Senate GOP majority map threw her under the bus.  There's talk she might run in the North Country district against Owens, anyway.  The Conservative Party chairman likes her and would back her.

[cinyc]

The Republican Assembly Minority had no objection to the court's proposed redistricting plan.  The inept Democratic Senate Minority wrote a letter to the judge stating they have no comment, as did the Democratic Assembly Majority.  The court warned the Assembly Majority that failure to object now might constitute a waiver to the three-judge panel ultimately responsible for redistricting.

The Republican Senate Majority objected to the orientation of the Long Island districts, carving up Turner's district, carving up the Jewish and Russian population of Southern Brooklyn, taking the northern counties away from Gibson's NY-19 and some minor technical changes to certain CD boundaries.

The Rose Intervenors complained that they weren't given enough time to respond and objected to some aspects of CDs 3, 4, 17, 21, 25, and 26.  The Hispanic groups generally approved of the plan but objected to certain Brooklyn neighborhoods being moved into Maloney's district.  Other intervenors had largely minor technical comments.

[cinyc]

Slaughter's seat in that map is around 59% Obama. How many 59% Obama seats are held by Republicans? The only one I can think of is that one in Illinois that was barely held in 2010 against a horrible twice loser candidate and is in Illinois so Obama's margin is obviously inflated.

Slaughter is the one who doesn't like her new district for whatever reason.  Perhaps she's worried about representing a district that's over 60% new territory.  That's a recipe to get primaried down the road.  (There's going to be virtually no time in between the time these maps are adopted and the petition period this cycle.)  And she's going from a very safe district to one that is a little more marginal, albeit safe most cycles.

[cinyc]

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/2012/03/breaking-news-deals-near-on-everything-updatedx3

BREAKING NEWS: Deals Near On Everything

While it's not entirely clear from the article, "everything" probably only includes the state Senate and Assembly redistricting, not the US House map.  Democrats are supposedly fighting too much among themselves to compromise on the House map.

[cinyc]

I'm really have a tough time following all the twists and turns of this byzantine redistricting proces.  Can someone inform me if this very basic summary is right-

Dems and Reps cannot agree on map

Cuomo is pissed and an agreement is hammered out by both parties to have an independent Judge draw up a map

Craven career politicians on both sides get scared and decide to cooperate to perpetuate their power

Cuomo throws up his hands and punts 10 years for change in state Constit.
- Lost on where things stand now.

I know their will be several different Republican primaries and I'm looking to see even what districts I will be in.

Any links to updates would be appreciated.

The Assembly passed the state Senate and Assembly redistricting plans tonight 93-43.   The State Senate just passed it 36-0 with most Democrats leaving the chamber because debate was cut off after 2.5 hours.  The Senate then passed the constitutional amendment creating an independent redistricting commission in 2020.  Because constitutional amendments require passage by two successive legislatures, there's some sort of hammer provision that takes away the ability of the legislators to appoint members to the commission if it's not passed again next year.  The legislature has a sort of veto power over the commission maps, though they wouldn't have free reign to draw whatever they want.  The Senate and Assembly majority wanted to pass this tonight because there's a court hearing on the progress of the state maps tomorrow.

This is all part of a grand compromise package that includes casino gambling, pension reform and redistricting reform, among other things, which is why Cuomo is caving.

The US House maps are NOT included in this package.

[cinyc]

Thanks a million, Cinyc.  It seems that following all of the twists in Albany is nearly a full time job.  Do you have a link to the maps that were passed and what in the world is going on with the House now? I'm a registered Republican and will probably have like 3 different primaries on separate dates. I'm doing my best to try and keep up.

State Senate
Assembly

We're almost certainly going to have three primaries this year - the Presidential primary in April, the federal offices primary in June and the state offices primary in September, assuming there are candidates in your district for the latter two.  There probably will be a Republican primary for US Senator given the number of declared candidates, so it's really a question of whether there are multiple State Senate and Assembly candidates in your districts (or a local race, if there is one).  Some good government groups want to hold the state primaries in June, too - but the petitioning period would begin in a matter of weeks if they did that, so it's probably not going to happen.

[cinyc]

http://atr.rollcall.com/new-york-gary-ackerman-to-retire/

Longtime New York Democratic Rep. Gary Ackerman will retire at the end of the 112th Congress, he announced tonight.



Crowley elbowed Ackerman out.

One would have thought Ackerman would have been competitive. Crowley gets a lot of new territory too. I'm surprised. Is that just because I don't know enough on this one? 

Crowley has wanted an all-Queens district instead of representing the Bronx.   It's not clear that he's running in NY-06 yet, though.

The ironic thing is that a Democrat who was thinking of running against Ackerman announced he wasn't running this afternoon before Ackerman's announcement.

[cinyc]

The Senate wouldn't have proposed this map if they didn't think it secured things stronger (exactly how much that is in reality, who knows)

In Long Island, the tipping point seats will have Dem PVIs, probably D+3 to D+5, but I don't know exactly.  Truthfully, I suspect most (if not all) of the seats would be marginal in a national environment, after all Long Island as a whole is about D+1, D+2.  I need to really break down the changes in the SDs to see what happened to SDs 3, 5, 6 and 7, as these were the problem/close seats in 2006/2008.  The GOP controls it all - so all they can go is down, anyways.

In NYC, Lanza is a GOP PVI seat, the NY Jew seat is certainly one, though historically Dem down the ballot (but that is probably changing too).  Golden's seat certainly got more Republican areas, so it may have gotten back to a GOP PVI (I know it wasn't before), but I don't know for sure.  At any rate, Golden will never be beaten so long as he's on the ballot, so who cares. 

As you are aware, the GOP lost their last historical seat in Queens in the last election, but I don't know whether any of the games that I'm seeing would have any effect in the Queens seats that are most favorable to the GOP.  I suspect not, as I think that ship has sailed.  The Republicans aren't packed like they are in Brooklyn.

All in all, I really can only see the GOP, at best, getting one seat from this map in NYC and Long Island.  (presently 24-11 (techically 23-11-1), with 2 "independent" Dems) Upstate is 21-6, so I have to see what seats have actually been made more problematic.  Upstate will be later, and I'll give a little more of a close look.

SD-37 was gerrymandered to give Republicans their best shot at winning a Westchester seat.  With the Republican incumbents in SD-34 and 35 long gone, the more Republican-leaning areas of those districts, Eastchester and Eastern Yonkers, were added to SD-37, while Democratic-leaning Scarsdale and parts of White Plains and New Rochelle were put into SD-35.   SD-37 also added Republican-leaning Bedford and lost Ossining and New Castle in the northern part of the county.  The SD-37 incumbent Democrat is retiring after almost losing under the more Dem-favorable old lines last cycle, so the Senate must think the district will be competitive if not lean Republican.

[cinyc]

Oppenheimer almost lost in 2010 because independents were more Republican than they will ever be for another 40 years and Democratic turnout fell through the floor.  The only way Republicans will pick up that seat in 2012 is if the Obama percentage is moved down to the low 50's. 

Upstate, there are only three Democratic held districts and they will probably need to be packed further to help out Republican incumbents in surrounding areas.  I wonder what they did to help Greg Ball just north of Westchester, who only won 51%-49% in the best Republican year in many generations. 

Given that Westchester state senate districts have been held by Republicans in the past decade, I seriously doubt that independents were more Republican in 2010 than they will ever be for 40 years.  They were even more Republican in prior years when Republicans won and can be more Republican in the future. 

Coattails are overrated.  Republicans hold plenty of Long Island State Senate seats where Obama was in the mid-50s.  A Republican could win SD-37 under similar circumstances.

Ball was given the other Republican-friendly town in old SD-35, Mount Pleasant.  It is one of the most Republican-leaning towns in the county.  But he lost about half of Putnam County, so that may just offset what was lost instead of shore him up.  Without the need to shore up a Republican incumbent, SD-35 is now a Democratic vote sink in the southern and central parts of Westchester.

[cinyc]

Republicans held those Long-Island seats as LONG TIME INCUMBENTS.  The Westchester districts were held by Republicans in the past, just like Democrats held many districts in Alabama and Tennessee in the past.

Westchester County is not Alabama or Tennessee.  The county executive is a Republican and Republicans picked up county board seats last cycle.  Part of the county has a Republican congresswoman.  If anything, the county is trending Republican after trending Democratic during the Bush years.

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It will be a totally open seat with no incumbent at all that voted 50-50 in the 2010 legislative elections.  And coattails are overrated.   Republicans won back the state Senate last cycle despite having a dreadful gubernatorial candidate at the top of the ticket. 

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Not a ton.  It's hard to tell exactly what happened because Long Island doesn't have many towns and the maps don't show villages, but it looks like SD-07 took in a little bit more of Hicksville in exchange for losing part of Elmont.  That's about it.  I'd be surprised if its partisan makeup moved more than a point.

[cinyc]

I'd say the biggest problem for the Monroe County Executive woman is that she can get elected in a low-turnout off-year election, but she's going to have an extra 200,000 Presidential-year voters who have never voted for or against her. Torie's acting more like redcommander with the irrational exuberance over this woman.

Torie's exuberance is far from irrational.  No New York Congressman squawked louder about the new lines than Slaughter, even getting Nancy Pelosi in on the act.  Had she not done so, I'd agree with your assessment.  But Slaughter must know something, like how a countywide official elected under pretty much the same lines as the CD might give her a run for her money, enough so that she'd actually have to actively campaign - a process with which she is sorely out of practice for at least the last decade due to gerrymandering.  Beware of candidates who haven't had to run in a competitive race for a while.  They sometimes implode.