2020 Census and Redistricting Thread: Virginia

[jamestroll]

VA Reps may push the 5-1 court to do something like this: https://davesredistricting.org/join/bce45050-8fd6-4923-9e68-81b01682d91d


5 and 7 are the leftovers, but the leftovers clearly benefit the GOP, the VRA seats are strengthened, which just happens to help shore up 2, and Albemarle honestly doesn't have a clear place to go, so I can see the 5-1 court just sticking it in Appalachia. In a vacuum, each of these decisions can clearly be justified as fine pairings, but on the broader scale, the side effects create a blatantly lopsided map, 6 might be vulnerable, but Appalachia is probably inelastic enough, 7 might also be vulnerable, but is currently D held anyways, I would not be shocked if the final map looks more like this than the quad cuts of Fairfax being proposed in this thread, and other than the NoVA seats, this map isn't even that ugly.

The Virginia Supreme Court is nominally 5 republicans and 2 democrats, but of those 5 republicans, only three are partisan hacks. One of them is basically a liberal democrat, and another is a hardcore ideologue but a very weak partisan. There is no way anything like what you've drawn becomes the map.

Everyone is acting like the Virginia Supreme Court is going to draw like a 8 to 3 or 9 to  2 GOP gerrymander and that the amendment passing prevents Democrats from winning any statewide offices next year. Its getting a bit ridiculous with the takes on this amendment.

[jamestroll]

VA Reps may push the 5-1 court to do something like this: https://davesredistricting.org/join/bce45050-8fd6-4923-9e68-81b01682d91d


5 and 7 are the leftovers, but the leftovers clearly benefit the GOP, the VRA seats are strengthened, which just happens to help shore up 2, and Albemarle honestly doesn't have a clear place to go, so I can see the 5-1 court just sticking it in Appalachia. In a vacuum, each of these decisions can clearly be justified as fine pairings, but on the broader scale, the side effects create a blatantly lopsided map, 6 might be vulnerable, but Appalachia is probably inelastic enough, 7 might also be vulnerable, but is currently D held anyways, I would not be shocked if the final map looks more like this than the quad cuts of Fairfax being proposed in this thread, and other than the NoVA seats, this map isn't even that ugly.

The Virginia Supreme Court is nominally 5 republicans and 2 democrats, but of those 5 republicans, only three are partisan hacks. One of them is basically a liberal democrat, and another is a hardcore ideologue but a very weak partisan. There is no way anything like what you've drawn becomes the map.

Everyone is acting like the Virginia Supreme Court is going to draw like a 8 to 3 or 9 to  2 GOP gerrymander and that the amendment passing prevents Democrats from winning any statewide offices next year. Its getting a bit ridiculous with the takes on this amendment.

Looking at the 2020 results...would Republicans really even "want" a 8R-3D map anymore?   Republicans in eastern Virginia (east of VA-6 basically) are kinda on thin ice as it is right now.  I don't think they really have the room to gerrymander the map all that much (sane maps that a commission would draw). 

I'm thinking it's more realistic they agree to concede VA-7 in exchange for making VA-5 and VA-1 safer.  Not much you can do with VA-2 anyway.

Virginia is a state that will continue to trend Democratic. Even if Nova moderates a bit (very likely but not to the extent some Republicans think it will) the trends towards Democrats in the Richmond area are very promising and the eastern shore is shaky for the GOP at best and there is hardly any room for the GOP to grow in rural VA unless they make significant in roads with African Americans.

The whole circus about this redistricting amendment has been over blown. It probably starts at a 6 D to 5 R  map.

[jamestroll]

ohh.. no..ughh Barbara Comstock may be my congresswoman..

[jamestroll]

ohh.. no..ughh Barbara Comstock may be my congresswoman..

She was mine for a time...

It would be a night mare if Barbara Trumpstock was my congress woman and Glenn Trumpkin was my governor.. makes me want to puke and vomit all over the floor.

[jamestroll]

The 10th is going to be very close.. ugh I except mass violence no matter who wins..

I hope the red necks dont invade Loudoun County if Wexton wins.

[jamestroll]

am currently not sober and made this beautiful, by putting zero thought in it, 9-2 map

Please judge it mercilessly



https://davesredistricting.org/join/6524e592-5a07-4536-a68c-8de52097ec34

This is probably 7-4 in a neutral year.

With how Loudoun is trending? I don't see it.

two-term Governor T-Mac agrees

Actually, the trendlines in Loudoun are pretty clear. Even in a perfect storm for them, Rs lost Loudoun by 12. Need I point out the margin Rs won Loudoun in 2009?
"muh T-Mac" is something of a lazy response, tbh.

The point is that we have no idea if Loudoun will trend further left or if it's maxed out. Recent elections if anything suggest it's probably maxed out. In general, I find it pretty idiotic how many posters here will just make maps that only work under wild assumptions of previous decades' swings to continue indefinitely. We have no f**king clue what trends will be like in the next decade. It's not like people in 2010 knew what the trends in that decade would look like either, or else they would have drawn very different maps.

WHY DOES EVERYONE HAVE THIS FETISH THAT LOUDOUN COUNTY WILL BECOME A GOP COUNTY AGAIN?

Unless there is a mass exodus out of it due to remote work.. it will not be a gop county for the foreseeable future.  it is whiter and wealthier then Fairfax and Prince William, so it will not be as Democrat as them but still..

[jamestroll]

WHY DOES EVERYONE HAVE THIS FETISH THAT LOUDOUN COUNTY WILL BECOME A GOP COUNTY AGAIN?

Unless there is a mass exodus out of it due to remote work.. it will not be a gop county for the foreseeable future.  it is whiter and wealthier then Fairfax and Prince William, so it will not be as Democrat as them but still..

I never said it would vote for the GOP? Are you ok? You sound off your rocker. Take a chill pill and read my posts again.

I'm the first person to admit we don't know for certain how things will swing in the future and very much agree with your broader point regarding certainty. American politics are unpredictable.

But in a neutral year, Rs still likely lose the Loudoun district. It's got too high of a D baseline. It has Charlottesville, Loudoun, and part of Fairfax, which delivers a lot of Dem votes. It's R-winnable for sure, but if forced to bet on who wins the seat in anything but an R wave, I'd still chose the Democrats.

This district voted for Biden by 0.6 points. Hillary actually lost it by 6. To call it anything but lean R at this stage is delusional, and while speculation about future trends can be fun, it is just that, speculation.

0.6 Biden win is narrower than I had thought. I'd still consider it a tossup CD though, not a lean R one.
In any case, your contention was that in a neutral year, this would be 7D-4R. Implying that that Cheseapeake CD would also be flipping. I don't see it. Maybe further down the decade, perhaps.

The Chesapeake CD is more a pure tossup admittedly, but the Loundoun-Shenandoah one is objectively Lean R. Tilt R at the very least. It was basically tied in a D+5 year.

I think you mixed up the districts. Londoun-Shenadoah was Biden +9.

Which for reference, is about as democratic VA-10 was in 2016.

Ye the proposed VA-10 in the new draft map should start out as at least lean D in 2022 if it stays as is. It basically voted in line with VA but is prolly more reacative that your average dostroct

Holy f**king sh*t. Three people in a row who don't bother to read the whole exchange, misunderstand what it's actually about, and just come in hot and ready to "correct" me with something irrelevant to what I was talking about. After I had already corrected someone else for doing the exact same thing.

This forum has become such a f**king clown show. Unbelievable.

That new VA 10 did vote for Joe Biden by 9 points. It is not impossible for wexton to win though it will be tough.

I. WILL. NOT. TOLERATE. PEOPLE. WHO. SAY. LOUDOUN. WILL. BE. A. GOP. COUNTY. AT. ALL.

In fact, the people who for six months screamed that Youngkin would win Loudoun and possible Nova out right owe everyone a huge apology.

[jamestroll]

If Virginia does gain a district, it may be possible to draw an Asian-plurality district in west Fairfax/east Loudoun counties by 2030. Would be very interesting - the first such district outside of Hawaii, California and NYC, and the first truly new Asian-interest seat since Grace Meng’s created in the 2010 cycle.

I would love that.

Nova Asians = good people in a genuine and ideological way. My specific neighborhood was quite Asian to say the least.

I still remember told they would vote for Trumpkin thomas jefferson school. hahahahahahaa. They at very least "trended" dem from 2020 election.

[jamestroll]

Wow, this is interesting!

On paper, the median district got slightly more Republican (Biden +9ish 1st draft to Biden +7ish final draft), but Democrats would probably prefer a setup where Spanberger, with her track record of winning highly competitive elections, can run in the median district instead of Wexton, who severely underperformed Biden?  Note Clinton actually did better in 2016 in final draft VA-07 than in 1st draft VA-10.

Final draft VA-02 is still Biden +2ish, as in the 1st draft.  Luria is probably out of luck in 2022 unless the national environment dramatically improves.   

VA-05 takes all of Charlottesville and Albemarle, but is still just safe enough to stay Republican for the decade (Trump +11 2016 to Trump +8 2020). 

Final draft VA-01 is now much more suburban dominated and looks like a Dem flip waiting to happen (Trump +14 2016 to Trump +7 2020).

Looks like the state legislative map changes were minor?  According to the document, median district partisanship stayed almost exactly the same in both chambers, meaning the state senate slightly favors Democrats on paper and the HoD slightly favors Republicans on paper vs. statewide results.

This held up very well.  Wexton would very likely have lost the 1st draft VA-10 to Cao while Spanberger landslided in the 1st draft VA-07 with all of Prince William in it (assuming she didn't lose the primary to a Prince William Dem).  Wexton and Spanberger had nearly the same margin of victory on the final map. 

yea, I did long think that Spanberger and Wexton would finish quite closely. I met both of them, and both are extremely nice. I do find Wexton a weak campaigner, but to be fair, Biden 2020 is not a baseline of VA-10. However, I think the natural lean of that district is closer to Biden 2020 than Youngkin 2021.