Redistricting 2020, doomed incumbents

[politicallefty]

Don't underestimate parochial concerns by individual members. That's traditionally been one of the biggest restraints on the most extreme gerrymandering.

[politicallefty]

PA: Anything north/west of SEPA and the Lancaster/York/Dauphin region is up for grabs. My take is PA09, but could be 15, could be 12, who knows.

Pennsylvania should be pretty interesting. I think it's a fairly safe assumption the the current map will be the baseline for the next decade considering very likely divided government and the PA Supreme Court with a Democratic majority (and very likely to maintain precedent). My first thought looking at the current map would've been PA-12, but kind of mentally re-configuring the map sort of merges it with PA-09 (with the surrounding districts all taking is some new territory from the two).

The problem for Democrats in PA is that by eliminating an R seat (which pretty much has to happen considering population trends and the geography of the state), the non-SEPA incumbents will get tougher seats. PA-18 would have to expand even if PA stayed at 18, likely forcing PA-17 to get a lot more of Butler County. PA-08 probably moves a couple notches rightward. PA-16 moving eastward takes it off the table for Democrats if it was ever really there. PA-01 is probably the only competitive seat in the state to move leftward, probably a couple points at the expense of PA-04. I admit I haven't tried to draw the state with 17 districts yet because of intrastate population trends, just looking over it in my mind.


Two other points:
-OH: I'm only interested in the new constraints on how lines can be drawn since I think that's all that will be relevant. I expect Republicans to ram through their own 4-year plan. However, the constraints are very relevant as to how far they can go. Doesn't the language of the new amendment basically doom Chabot? I'm not sure what they could conceivably do to Hamilton County, but at minimum, Cincinnati cannot be split. I also want to note that somehow Democrats picked up 2 seats on the OH Supreme Court. If they do that again, they could get a majority on the court and the redistricting amendment gives the OH Supreme Court exclusive original jurisdiction on the matter.

-MD: I'm surprised no one's mentioned Maryland as a possibility as I think Democrats could go for an 8-0 map. Hogan may be the governor, but Democrats far exceed the 3/5 supermajority necessary to override if necessary. The map is unnecessarily hideous in part because Dutch Ruppersberger wants two distant military installations in his district. I'm not sure why MD-03 is such a monstrosity. The balance between partisan allegiance and parochial interests will probably determine the fate of MD-01 (i.e. Andy Harris).

[politicallefty]

I played around with Utah a bit. If Republicans can't pizza slice Salt Lake County, they could actually risk a 2-2 delegation. A district entirely within Salt Lake County, but starting from the far more Republican south and moving up and taking in the most Republican areas, you get a district that voted for McCain by about 56-41 (R+13 2012/2016 PVI). That's a couple points to the left of Matheson's old seat, but entirely urban/suburban and very winnable for certain Utah Democrats. The problem for Republicans if they can't pizza slice SLC is that the county in its entirety is about 1.5 districts. If you take the remainder of Salt Lake County and combine it with most of ultra-Republican Utah County, you end up with a 55-42 McCain district (R+10). Once again, absolutely winnable for Utah Dems. On the other hand, a Salt Lake County district that takes in all of SLC and the more Democratic areas and moves south ends up at about 56-41 Obama (D+5) and basically safely Democratic. In that case, the rest of the state is extremely off-limits for Democrats.   

[politicallefty]

Minnesota probably depends somewhat on whether or not Democrats get total control over redistricting. That probably depends on whether or not Democrats can win back the MN Senate. It has one of the stranger terms, with elections in the 0-2-6 years, so there was no opportunity for a big win in 2018 (like the massive win Democrats had in the MN House).

Either way, I think the current MN-07 is done (and there does seem to be the expectation that one way or the other Colin Peterson will not be running in 2022 anyway, either through defeat or winning one last term). Like most, I expect MN-08 to move west to the ND border, taking in the northern third of the state. That could actually pull it a couple points to the left if drawn right, but the trendlines are very bad. After that, the outstate districts basically draw themselves. If Dems have total control, I think they try lock down the current four districts they have around MSP and maybe tinker around the edges in the outstate districts.

I don't think Democrats would ever try to attempt a 5-2 map unless they somehow won back MN-01 or MN-08 this year (the latter being a much further reach than the former). Even then, it's going to be a monstrosity. I might give it a try soon, but it'd have to involve separating Duluth from the more Republican western areas of the Iron Range and sending it down into the MSP area. A district that runs from the Duluth area and runs down along the Wisconsin border taking in Washington County and ending in Rochester would be almost exactly even between Clinton and Trump. Short of and still possibly including a number of tentacles, that'd leave a contiguous region in MSP stretching to Mankato and St. Cloud at roughly 59-60% two-party vote for Clinton to divide among 4 districts.

I was thinking about something like this:


It was just a rough draft so not even close to perfected or anything of the sort (not to mention dividing the state into 7 parts based on the 2010 Census). It's just to get a visual. The blue district is 1 district that's about 50-50 Clinton-Trump. The yellow area is roughly equal to 4/7 of the population, and close to 60% Clinton two-party share. The purple is about 2 districts that voted just over 2-1 Trump over Clinton. If Dems have full power over the pen, I think they should absolutely go for what I'm showing here. It's not 5-2, more like 4D-2R-1, but I like the D odds in the blue seat. If Nashville is facing a pizza slice, Democrats in other states need to be aggressive and that could and should include Minnesota.