US House Redistricting: Iowa

[CookieDamage]

[S019]

You are not allowed to chop counties at all in Iowa

[The Undefeatable Debbie Stabenow]

https://davesredistricting.org/join/21cb298c-5c29-4cad-84df-9648be01b74b

This is too good to be true for Democrats but it's pretty neatly organized. Blue is D+<1, purple is D+5, red is R+33, and green is R+13. So, effectively 1 Safe R, 1 Likely R, 1 Lean D, and 1 Tossup.

[CookieDamage]

No county cutting. Two safe R districts with two lean D districts. However, Des Moines is growing and could make the seat likely D. IDK about the Davenport-Iowa City-Dubuque seat.

[Stuart98]

Put together a State Senate map:



https://davesredistricting.org/join/3292b655-5664-42a6-9abd-f9433c58b7dd

Seat composition:
2016: 34 Trump — 16 Clinton
2018: 31 Reynolds — 19 Hubbell

State House map:



https://davesredistricting.org/join/777a517a-251c-4e74-a547-5cb37e6b7f14

Seat composition:
2016: 66 Trump — 34 Clinton
2018: 57 Reynolds — 43 Hubbell

Can you get these maps color-coded for partisan purposes?  I have no doubt I will see a Republican sea of red (or Atlas blue) interspersed with a few tiny Democratic islands, but still.  

Are these meant to be Republican gerrymanders, or is it just the nature of geography in Iowa that Dems will win a much lower % of the seats than their PV performance reflects? Specifically looking at the share of Hubbell seats relative to his ~48% share of the popular vote.

The latter. The current map is fairly similar in the number of Clinton districts.

Iowa Geography is pretty bad for Democrats under current coalitions, though it's much better with slightly older Obama era coalitions.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Is it even possible to create a map for either state legislative chamber in Iowa with a majority of Clinton districts?

[America Needs a 13-6 Progressive SCOTUS]

Is it even possible to create a map for either state legislative chamber in Iowa with a majority of Clinton districts?

Probably if you get really crafty. I know its possible to draw a 3 District map with 2 Clinton Districts.

[Roll Roons]

I think the commission could produce something like this:
https://davesredistricting.org/join/3ad4c15b-fadd-4eb7-ae12-70b1ec3ab71c

IA-01 and IA-02 don't change that much. Both of them voted for Trump, the former by about 5 and the latter by about 4. Hinson and Miller-Meeks will start out favored in 2022, but one or both could certainly lose in a blue wave.

IA-03, still centered on Des Moines, becomes a lot bluer at Biden +7, as it loses rural areas and gains Story. This seat is within reach for the GOP in a good year, but Axne should be favored most of the time. Even Hillary won it by 4.

IA-04 is even redder than the current version. Especially with an incumbent who isn't Steve King, this seat will be Safe R for quite some time.

[Meatball Ron]

I think the commission could produce something like this:
https://davesredistricting.org/join/3ad4c15b-fadd-4eb7-ae12-70b1ec3ab71c

IA-01 and IA-02 don't change that much. Both of them voted for Trump, the former by about 5 and the latter by about 4. Hinson and Miller-Meeks will start out favored in 2022, but one or both could certainly lose in a blue wave.

IA-03, still centered on Des Moines, becomes a lot bluer at Biden +7, as it loses rural areas and gains Story. This seat is within reach for the GOP in a good year, but Axne should be favored most of the time. Even Hillary won it by 4.

IA-04 is even redder than the current version. Especially with an incumbent who isn't Steve King, this seat will be Safe R for quite some time.

Great map

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I think the commission could produce something like this:
https://davesredistricting.org/join/3ad4c15b-fadd-4eb7-ae12-70b1ec3ab71c

IA-01 and IA-02 don't change that much. Both of them voted for Trump, the former by about 5 and the latter by about 4. Hinson and Miller-Meeks will start out favored in 2022, but one or both could certainly lose in a blue wave.

IA-03, still centered on Des Moines, becomes a lot bluer at Biden +7, as it loses rural areas and gains Story. This seat is within reach for the GOP in a good year, but Axne should be favored most of the time. Even Hillary won it by 4.

IA-04 is even redder than the current version. Especially with an incumbent who isn't Steve King, this seat will be Safe R for quite some time.

Great map

[Torie]

I was interested in how the legal parameters of Iowa redistricting are weighted, and did a substantial amount of research. Two things leapt out at me. First it is illegal to reject a map or enact a map for partisan reasons. A rejection of a map by the legislature or by a veto of the governor, for partisan reasons, is illegal, so a rejection on those grounds would be illegal, and would have to be masked by disingenuous BS.

Second, the reason I was doing the research, is that I was unclear how population equality and erosity are weighted vis a vis each other. Population equality is the primary concern, subject to not chopping counties with a 1% deviation standard. My research was not productive in finding an answer to that question, other than one squib I found regarding the 2011 Iowa map, which stated that a computer drew the map based solely on minimizing population inequality.

So, until the census numbers are out, drawing Iowa maps is well, a waste of time, and second trying to draw partisan maps is a waste of time no only for that reason, but because they are illegal.

It is possible  that if population equality rules all in Map 1, the legislature could tell the technocrats to draw a map 2 that has more population inequality but less erosity. In reality, since the technocrats have apparently reduced themselves to mindless robots, the Pubs in secret might see if there is a map out there using their own computer black box, that they like more that is less erose, with more population inequality. If there isn't, then they would accept the first map. If not, they tell the techs to draw a map with less erosity, knowing exactly what will come out of the black box before they ask.

Reading the public comments about the 2011 map was at once funny and sad. Almost all  of what they wanted changed, was illegal. The only request from the public that would/might be legal would be well, the balancing of population and erosity - maybe.

That said, before I knew the Iowa law, as it is structured as to the hierarchy of its requirements, and in practice, I drew the below. Whether it is a Pubmander, or dummymander, and/or a Torie brain fart, I have no idea. It does have a screen shot of the above referenced squib superimposed on it, for you cynics out there who suspect that I am writing fiction packaged as fact, or am too senile/demented/deranged, to be able to differentiate between the two.  .


And there you have it, or not. The Pubs here can go back to gerrymandering TX, and the Dems to drawing something as horrible looking as possible in Illinois and Maryland, where there are no rules, other than the federal ones.

[Biden his time]

I tried my hand at a fair 4-district map of Iowa.

Image Link

The Population Deviation is 0.77%, and it reflects 2015 - 2019 ACS Data.

--/100 on Dave's Proportionality Index
--/100 on the Compactness Index
100/100 on County Splitting (that's mandatory though)
0/100 on the Minority Representation index (lol)
--/100 on Dave's competitiveness index

For the other indices DRA isn't quite loading right for me.

The map above shows results from the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election.

Check it out here and see county and municipality boundaries.


Partisan Breakdown by Election

2016 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 4R

2016 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2018 Iowa Attorney General Election: 4D

2018 Iowa Gubernatorial Election: 3D to 1R

2020 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2020 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D


Opinions?

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I tried my hand at a fair 4-district map of Iowa.

Image Link

The Population Deviation is 0.77%, and it reflects 2015 - 2019 ACS Data.

--/100 on Dave's Proportionality Index
--/100 on the Compactness Index
100/100 on County Splitting (that's mandatory though)
0/100 on the Minority Representation index (lol)
--/100 on Dave's competitiveness index

For the other indices DRA isn't quite loading right for me.

The map above shows results from the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election.

Check it out here and see county and municipality boundaries.


Partisan Breakdown by Election

2016 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 4R

2016 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2018 Iowa Attorney General Election: 4D

2018 Iowa Gubernatorial Election: 3D to 1R

2020 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2020 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D


Opinions?

I like it.

[Skill and Chance]

I tried my hand at a fair 4-district map of Iowa.

Image Link

The Population Deviation is 0.77%, and it reflects 2015 - 2019 ACS Data.

--/100 on Dave's Proportionality Index
--/100 on the Compactness Index
100/100 on County Splitting (that's mandatory though)
0/100 on the Minority Representation index (lol)
--/100 on Dave's competitiveness index

For the other indices DRA isn't quite loading right for me.

The map above shows results from the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election.

Check it out here and see county and municipality boundaries.


Partisan Breakdown by Election

2016 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 4R

2016 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2018 Iowa Attorney General Election: 4D

2018 Iowa Gubernatorial Election: 3D to 1R

2020 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2020 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D


Opinions?

I think this is roughly what will happen.  Axne gets a Biden district due to the Des Moines growth and everything else comes off the table R. 

[Thunder98]

Here are another 2 version of a 3-2-1/3-1 IA maps.

https://davesredistricting.org/join/067ef6b6-fc61-4f42-8423-f407b322bd0b




https://davesredistricting.org/join/6c41ba71-9e5a-44c3-b431-16bc9a67362e

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

I tried my hand at a fair 4-district map of Iowa.

Image Link

The Population Deviation is 0.77%, and it reflects 2015 - 2019 ACS Data.

--/100 on Dave's Proportionality Index
--/100 on the Compactness Index
100/100 on County Splitting (that's mandatory though)
0/100 on the Minority Representation index (lol)
--/100 on Dave's competitiveness index

For the other indices DRA isn't quite loading right for me.

The map above shows results from the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election.

Check it out here and see county and municipality boundaries.


Partisan Breakdown by Election

2016 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 4R

2016 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2018 Iowa Attorney General Election: 4D

2018 Iowa Gubernatorial Election: 3D to 1R

2020 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2020 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D


Opinions?

Is it possible to get anything but a 0 in minority representation while following Iowa's redistricting laws?

[Hope For A New Era]

IDK about the Davenport-Iowa City-Dubuque seat.

Hopefully an Iowa expert can weigh in, but it looks more or less stable for the decade.

[Biden his time]

I tried my hand at a fair 4-district map of Iowa.

Image Link

The Population Deviation is 0.77%, and it reflects 2015 - 2019 ACS Data.

--/100 on Dave's Proportionality Index
--/100 on the Compactness Index
100/100 on County Splitting (that's mandatory though)
0/100 on the Minority Representation index (lol)
--/100 on Dave's competitiveness index

For the other indices DRA isn't quite loading right for me.

The map above shows results from the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election.

Check it out here and see county and municipality boundaries.


Partisan Breakdown by Election

2016 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 4R

2016 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2018 Iowa Attorney General Election: 4D

2018 Iowa Gubernatorial Election: 3D to 1R

2020 U.S. Senate Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D

2020 U.S. Presidential Election in Iowa: 3R to 1D


Opinions?

Is it possible to get anything but a 0 in minority representation while following Iowa's redistricting laws?

No lol

Even Oregon isn't capable of a minority district of any kind (DRA labelling it as not having enough in the way of racial diversity).

[TML]

Is it possible to get anything but a 0 in minority representation while following Iowa's redistricting laws?

I'll give you a hint: when 538 tried its hand at creating majority-minority districts in IA back in 2017-18 (using 2010 Census data), the best it could do was create a district which was about 20% non-white (and that required splitting 19 counties).

[Schiff for Senate]

Two maps for IA:
https://districtr.org/plan/33787
https://districtr.org/plan/33881

The first has a deviation of 0.38%.
The second has a deviation of 0.47%.

Both have similar enough districts:

FIRST - a western, and heavily Republican, district.
SECOND - a district based in North Iowa that voted for both Obama and Trump, the latter time convincingly.
THIRD - a Des Moines-centric district in Southern Iowa that voted for Obama in 2012 and then somewhat narrowly for Trump.
FOURTH - East Iowa. The Quad cities area, and the only Clinton district.

[Torie]

Two maps for IA:
https://districtr.org/plan/33787
https://districtr.org/plan/33881

The first has a deviation of 0.38%.
The second has a deviation of 0.47%.

Both have similar enough districts:

FIRST - a western, and heavily Republican, district.
SECOND - a district based in North Iowa that voted for both Obama and Trump, the latter time convincingly.
THIRD - a Des Moines-centric district in Southern Iowa that voted for Obama in 2012 and then somewhat narrowly for Trump.
FOURTH - East Iowa. The Quad cities area, and the only Clinton district.

The black box the techs use will not be drawing lines with that degree of erosity.

Yes, after throwing the black box results in the trash 3 times, the Pubs can draw their own lines, but alas they have some constraints:

State law establishes the following criteria for both congressional and state legislative districts:[32]

   Districts must be "convenient and contiguous."
   Districts must "preserve the integrity of political subdivisions like counties and cities."
   Districts must "to the extent consistent with other requirements, [be] reasonably compact–defined in terms of regular polygons, comparisons of length and width, and overall boundary perimeter."

Conclusion:

Your maps will most likely be found by the court to be illegal.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Do we have 2020 census figures per county now?

[muon2]

Do we have 2020 census figures per county now?

The state has made them available here:
https://www.iowadatacenter.org/data/decennial/Pop2020

In 2010 the population range was 76 with an average deviation of 29.25. I was able to reduce the range to 32 with greater erosity. We did modeling of range vs mean counties per district and a range less than 100 should again be possible.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

From the looks of it there are no easy ways to create a compact CD from only Polk County and eight counties around it that also produces very low deviation.

[patzer]

From the looks of it there are no easy ways to create a compact CD from only Polk County and eight counties around it that also produces very low deviation.

Interesting how populous that area is now- if you added all eight counties, you’d be 100022 people over target.

The most compact/neat option is Polk, Dallas, Jasper, Marshall, Story, Boone (excluding the three at the bottom), which results in a district 2343 under.

If that’s not close enough to target, there’s a closer option. Polk, Dallas, Jasper, Story, Warren, Madison. This is 212 under, and it’s still a decent shape- the three counties not included are the northwest, northeast, and southeast corners of the eight. Wouldn’t surprise me if they go for that.