2020 Census and Redistricting Thread: Louisiana

[Sol]

I expect St. Bernard  or at least most of it, will be part of the New Orleans based minority district.

Is there significant black flight there?

[Sol]

Here's a CVAP Black majority 2nd district which doesn't go into Baton Rouge or Lafayette.

[Sol]

Is there a way to draw a 4-2 map that gets rid of Abraham's district and not Graves's? It just seems like Graves's district is the natural one to get nuked but obviously that's suboptimal.

I mean a 4-2 map is pretty hard tbh without violating the VRA

[Sol]

Do VRA seats need to be >50% CVAP or do they just need to be pretty sure that it will almost always elect a minority representative? I'm trying to see how compact you can get a 4-2 map but it's surprisingly hard to get them over the hump with CVAP, they always seem to be just shy of 50%

It's pretty variable--the most important thing is that the minority community can elect their candidate of choice. This is why NC-01 and the two Virginia VRA districts are not that Black, while Latino districts are usually significantly higher in percentage (as Latinos have lower turnout most of the time and are also less politically homogeneous). As for Louisiana and other deep south states, it somewhat depends on how Democratic the White vote is--New Orleans whites are pretty Democratic these days, so there's a little more flexibility in Black %, but outside of the city votes are very racially polarized, so you probably do need an outright BCVAP majority.

Of course I could be getting something wrong as VRA interpretation is very confusing.

[Sol]

It's generally better to have a BVAP majority than a BVAP plurality, and generally better to have a BVAP plurality than a white plurality, and generally better to have a white plurality than a white majority.

I don't think that's necessarily correct--the former iteration of VA-03 was struck down because it packed Black voters.

[Sol]

I don't see a court drawing a second Dem CD myself. Other than doing away with the black seat gerrymander, this is designed within reason to be a least change map.

-snip-

Here's my take on a similar concept:


link

I figured Livingston Parish was a better fit with exurban New Orleans than Houma way down in the bayou. LA-02 is plurality Black but plurality white on CVAP, still it'd probably vote for the Black candidate of choice. You can probably get a little messy with it and push the Black #s up though.

[Sol]

That is certainly a reasonable map which the Pubs will not be drawing.

Ah, I took your initial map to be a fair one but I see now it was intended as a realistic Republican map.

[Sol]

Yeah sorry, I'm in the habit of drawing maps as if they were drawn by a commission--my map is probably not too realistic, thought I think it's decent?

[Sol]

Yeah sorry, I'm in the habit of drawing maps as if they were drawn by a commission--my map is probably not too realistic, thought I think it's decent?

Sure it's decent, but Livingston County is really the suburbs of Baton Rouge, rather than exurbs of NO.

I don't disagree, but IMO Houma in with St. Tammany is worse--putting one of the Florida parishes in with non-NOLA area Acadiana is bad CoI.

[Sol]

If you want to "save" Letlow, the easiest way is by making sure that Graves is the one who goes, which is pretty easy.

[Sol]

No, a Republican will not win a Biden +10 black seat in the south unless turnout just collapses among blacks. A narrower Biden +5 or so seat, maybe.

Letlow would've won a Biden +10 Black seat in 2022. Race dynamics would have been different in a swing seat, but it doesn't seem like it would've been close either. It could flip in 2024, but she got 10+% more than Trump in most Black counties in her district. And that's with some minor GOP candidates drawing votes. In a 1 v. 1 some of these Delta counties would have had 25 point margin swings to her. This double digit swing was mirrored in MS and AL Black Belt counties.

In some small more Black Parishes:
Morehouse Parish, Trump 56%, Letlow 66%, total GOP 69%
East Carroll Parish, Trump 36%, Letlow 47%, total GOP 50%
Madison Parish, Trump 41%, Letlow 54%, total GOP 56%
Tensas Parish, Trump 47%, Letlow 60%, total GOP 64%

In larger parishes:
Ouchita Parish, Trump 61%, Letlow 71%, total GOP 75%
Rapides Parish, Trump 65%, Letlow 70%, total GOP 77%

Turnout collapsed in 2022. It's not that far fetched to see huge swings in the Black South when it happened just last year. An entrenched incumbent like Sewell would be fine, but an entrenched GOP incumbent vs. a newcomer Dem is not so safe. In Louisiana especially there would be a good chance of a runoff which might feature lower Black turnout.

You're assuming that the dynamics of an uncompetitive safe-seat race would obtain in a scenario where LA-05 is a top Democratic target -- that seems like an unlikely assumption to make!

I'm not deeply familiar with Letlow, so I suppose it's possible that she overperforms, maybe even by a lot, but the political context of a safe seat mid term election against noname opposition is radically different than what the new seat is likely to be, which is one of the most Biden-voting seats held by a Republican in the country.

[Sol]

Also, has anyone found a reasonably clean way of drawing the New Orleans metro area? I've been playing around with a more compact configuration, making LA-02 plurality Black but still electing the candidate of choice. However, NOLA's crazy geography makes even drawing something reasonably compact difficult.

[Sol]

No, a Republican will not win a Biden +10 black seat in the south unless turnout just collapses among blacks. A narrower Biden +5 or so seat, maybe.

Letlow would've won a Biden +10 Black seat in 2022. Race dynamics would have been different in a swing seat, but it doesn't seem like it would've been close either. It could flip in 2024, but she got 10+% more than Trump in most Black counties in her district. And that's with some minor GOP candidates drawing votes. In a 1 v. 1 some of these Delta counties would have had 25 point margin swings to her. This double digit swing was mirrored in MS and AL Black Belt counties.

In some small more Black Parishes:
Morehouse Parish, Trump 56%, Letlow 66%, total GOP 69%
East Carroll Parish, Trump 36%, Letlow 47%, total GOP 50%
Madison Parish, Trump 41%, Letlow 54%, total GOP 56%
Tensas Parish, Trump 47%, Letlow 60%, total GOP 64%

In larger parishes:
Ouchita Parish, Trump 61%, Letlow 71%, total GOP 75%
Rapides Parish, Trump 65%, Letlow 70%, total GOP 77%

Turnout collapsed in 2022. It's not that far fetched to see huge swings in the Black South when it happened just last year. An entrenched incumbent like Sewell would be fine, but an entrenched GOP incumbent vs. a newcomer Dem is not so safe. In Louisiana especially there would be a good chance of a runoff which might feature lower Black turnout.

You're assuming that the dynamics of an uncompetitive safe-seat race would obtain in a scenario where LA-05 is top Democratic target -- that seems like an unlikely assumption to make!

I'm not deeply familiar with Letlow, so I suppose it's possible that she overperforms, maybe even by a lot, but the political context of a safe seat mid term election against noname opposition is radically different than what the new seat is likely to be, which is one of the most Biden-voting seats held by a Republican in the country.

Dynamics would be a lot different, but the Dems will have to completely clear the field or it will be hard to get above 50%. The jungle primary is a hindrance, as is Letlow's strength. I think the median scenario would probably be Biden winning the district 54-45, The D-R vote in the primary being 52-48 but where enough Dems run where it's really like 44 top D, 45 Letlow, etc. Then it goes to the runoff where Black turnout may drop further.

Also, Letlow did a lot better than Kennedy did in the Senate race against a different set of no-name candidates. I guess Gary Chambers is fine, but no one paid any attention to this race. I think she is genuinely strong; a telegenic single mother might be better suited to win over Black voters than a crotchety old racist White guy.

My point is that it's wildly speculative to assume that a Republican would win a highly Democratic, majority Black district in the most polarized region of the country, especially one which is likely to attract a high quality group of candidates.

I'm not counting Letlow out -- she can win if things go her way -- but the priors of anyone in analyzing this sort of district should rate her as an extreme underdog and the fact that people are saying otherwise kind of smells like cope to me.

This is especially true given that we don't even know what this district will look like. Redistricters, especially in Southern states, have a tendency to respond to court ordered VRA districts with higher than needed amount of packing, designed to make sure they comply with the ruling. They could decide to sabotage Graves instead, or draw a Shreveport-Baton Rouge district like Oryxslayer made before, which I believe would double-bunk Letlow and Johnson. All of these are possibilities, and we should wait before we assume that Julia Letlow is the next David Valadao or something.

[Sol]

There’s a lot of unwarranted assumptions in kwabbit’s response to mine. No, you cannot assume the crossover support she received against a nobody would hold up against a well-funded challenger in a high profile race. Second, there’s no precedence on the federal level of a Republican holding a seat that blue in the House. We’ve had Senate incumbents do welll in blue territory in the south, like Jonny Isakson. But it’s all against no names.

The only current-day equivalents are NY-04 Republican-held seats in California, which are both really an extremely different dynamic. Historically the only remotely close parallel would be Ann Northrup, who iirc did well in the Black community in Louisville, but that was almost 20 years ago, in a mostly white and much closer seat, and she lost.

[Sol]

There are a lot of different ways to draw a second VRA district in Louisiana, so if LA Republicans want to keep Letlow they can sacrifice Johnson or Letlow instead. Do GOPers have a sense of who they'd want to keep?

[Sol]

There are a lot of different ways to draw a second VRA district in Louisiana, so if LA Republicans want to keep Letlow they can sacrifice Johnson or Letlow instead. Do GOPers have a sense of who they'd want to keep?

"if LA Republicans want to keep Letlow they can sacrifice Letlow instead"

Did you mean to name somebody else?

Yes, Graves.

[Sol]

Mike Johnson's election as house speaker likely rules a map like this out; even in a map handed down by the court I don't see them being willing to take the heat for drawing out the speaker of the house.

I assume Letlow would just step aside for him? Though yeah, they probably don't do this.

[Sol]

I like the north-south divide more on paper, but IIRC road contiguity is pretty questionable unless you put in the west side Jefferson parish areas.

[Sol]

The absurdity of protecting Letlow because she is the only woman in the delegation. Not that it much matters to me which Republican gets the cut but that really is an example of identity politics that serves no purpose.

It’s just an excuse to cut Graves, who is a political enemy of Landry’s

It's most certainly an excuse, it's just weird seeing Republicans vocally support what is essentially affirmative action when they spend so much time railing against it.

It seems like people also just straight up like Letlow better, which makes sense; she has a moving personal story and if you're a Republican she seems like a potential rising star. Blue avs on here seemed pretty unhappy with the prospect of her losing office when this decision first came down but seem much less unhappy about Graves.