Illinois Redistricting Megathread

[Devils30]

https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/1399859335329636356

[Devils30]

Seems like Dems were just as aggressive downstate as expected but less aggressive in Chicagoland. It is badly gerrymandered, but you could produce a more compact map that still shores up Underwood and Newman better than this one does.

Kinzinger would beat Newman in a Biden +6 seat...if he survives primary. Huge if but he would have significant crossover appeal while Newman will have plenty of problems. Dems would be wise to preempt problems and recruit a primary challenger (not named Lipinski).

[Devils30]

Seems like Dems were just as aggressive downstate as expected but less aggressive in Chicagoland. It is badly gerrymandered, but you could produce a more compact map that still shores up Underwood and Newman better than this one does.

Kinzinger would beat Newman in a Biden +6 seat...if he survives primary. Huge if but he would have significant crossover appeal while Newman will have plenty of problems. Dems would be wise to preempt problems and recruit a primary challenger (not named Lipinski).

I don't deny that Kinzinger would have crossover appeal in this district but I don't see why Newman in particular would have problems? She's slightly to the left of the average Democrat, sure, but in 2020 she actually overperformed Biden by a tiny amount while most Congressional Democrats ran a couple of points behind him.

Newman voted against the Iron Dome. If the right actually spent resources challenging her she would have a lot of trouble. I also doubt Kinzinger would win a primary but he could definitely beat Newman one on one in a 52-46 Biden seat.

[Devils30]

This map seems designed to go up in flames when Kamala has her 2024 or 2028 run that collapses Dems even more in the midwest.

[Devils30]

Kinzinger's best chance would be to switch parties, get endorsements from all the Dem establishment figures over Newman. Unlikely at best but you never know.

[Devils30]

I don't think this map is worth dooming over, if Democrats are losing a Biden+6 seat the House is already gone and Republican recruitment in these areas hasn't exactly been stellar in the past. I think Virginia's scenario is plausible, but still probably an edge case. Still wouldn't mind Newman being shored up a little, though!

Yeah, it's still a decent bet to be a 14-3 map in a 2012 or 2020 type of year. And if Dems are losing IL-3, 17 it's probably an R 230-240 House seat year anyway.

[Devils30]

Lipinski says he's thinking of running

https://www.chicagobusiness.com/greg-hinz-politics/former-illinois-us-rep-dan-lipinski-considers-running-house-again

Lmao, drama already. Who said Illinois politics are stiff and boring?

He will get crushed without incumbency advantage lol

He’s probably considered a quasi-incumbent like David Valadao or Rick Scott.

There seems to be this fallacious assumption that "more marginal seat = better for Lipinski." This is wrong because the areas Lipinski enjoyed crossover support did not vote for him in the primaries. Those ethnic white suburbs backed Newman. The crossover voters are Republicans, and the voters who participate in the Dem primary are analogous to suburban whites in more Liberal parts of the collar. Lipinski won the madigan machine neighborhoods and Hispanics. Exhuming the Hispanic areas and adding in areas he never represented hurts Lipinski's odds at a comeback.

Which was likely her goal. Apparently she leveled a lot of demands and the commission could only follow a handful, especially since she's a freshman. We saw this before in Maryland, where Donna Edwards demanded a lot of the mappers, and they ignored almost all of her wishes in favor of the senior members of the delegation. She likely wanted to remove the Hispanics and add in as much white suburbs the Lipinski never repped as possible. Unable to follow this in full, she gets a weaker seat.

The resulting product though appears to have "taught some sense" as it were, since she criticized the map for removing Hispanic areas from her seat. Probably will change, ironically in a way that makes it more possible for primary battle round 3.

Good analysis. She think she's safe from Lipinski... but now she might lose to Kinzinger. I think she definitely pissed off the machine and they're going after her, even if Mike Madigan is not running it anymore.

I wonder if Lipinski would plan on pulling a Van Drew and switch parties.

That would be an entertaining Republican primary, the honorable Trump-hating conservative Kinzinger versus the former Democratic turncoat likely turned Trumpist (like Van Drew and Rod Blagojevich).

Kinzinger could beat Newman by 12 in this seat. Newman is basically part of the far left which doesn't work in seats like this. Dems really should think twice before approving this map and go back to the drawing board.

[Devils30]

They really, really hate Newman it seems.

Indeed, it looks like the Madigan machine still has punch even if he is not running it anymore.

I do not think this is the case and certainly would not expect Casten to be favored in that seat.

That's what I noticed as well. They completely obliterated the current IL-06. In the abstract, that would make sense, since that district was originally drawn to be the Republican vote sink for Chicagoland. Obviously, trends have moved us past the need for such a district. But that's in the abstract, as opposed to reality with an actual Democratic incumbent. If I didn't know any better, I would think they're not too fond of Casten. On the other hand, it does like the most Democratic precincts from the current IL-06 are in the proposed new IL-06.

Why would you expect that Newman would win the D primary in the new IL-06? This does not look like progressive friendly territory and Casten has seniority over Newman.

In any case, combine this with the first draft which had Newman in a district with Kinzinger that she could easily lose to him, and to me it indicates that the IL legislature (a.k.a. machine) has the knives out for Newman.

Casten will be much harder for Newman than Lipinski. Lipinski was anti-abortion and still came close to holding on, Casten won't have this problem.