2020 New York Redistricting

[Torie]

Can someone explain to me why “the right” on social media and otherwise thinks that the special master is a “Democrat” and that the maps won’t be that much better for Republicans?

He is either Democratic biased or prefers partisan fairness . He drew the pa state leg maps which are discussed here as a mild to medium gerrymander for the state house where geography is disfavorable to Democrats..
However the maps will definitely be much better for Republicans  than the enacted maps. Our guess is there be some slightly D favorable moves by Mr.Cervas as he may be fearful towards Democrats nationwide prospects . Overall this is still an unmitigated disaster for Democrats.

Who is "our?"

I don't think Cervas is that biased myself, if at all. Where he had two reasonable choices, he picked the one that effected better proportionality. He didn't do anything that was out there.

[Torie]

The Dems bless them could not agree upon who should be tossed overboard, or severely inconvenienced. So they submitted about the same map that the Courts rejected, and will let the special master and the trial judge decide that issue. Perfectly reasonable when you think about it.

[Torie]

Did you know it is possible to draw a 30% Asian district in Southern Brooklyn?

33.3333% is the number that is whispering, whispering in my ear.

[Torie]

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/02/nyregion/redistricting-democrats-appeal.html

NY Dems lawsuit.

This one is so bad, that it might be subject to sanctions (paying the fees and costs for the defendant to respond) for filing a frivolous lawsuit. I will leave it at that.

[Torie]

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/02/nyregion/redistricting-democrats-appeal.html

NY Dems lawsuit.

This one is so bad, that it might be subject to sanctions for filing a frivolous lawsuit. I will leave it at that.

I mean does a Federal court not need to give approval to move the primary?

No. Primary dates are a matter of state law. That is why we have primary dates all over the place.

[Torie]

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/02/nyregion/redistricting-democrats-appeal.html

NY Dems lawsuit.

This one is so bad, that it might be subject to sanctions for filing a frivolous lawsuit. I will leave it at that.

I mean does a Federal court not need to give approval to move the primary?

No. Primary dates are a matter of state law. That is why we have primary dates all over the place.

US House is a FEDERAL election. The federal court can(they won't but my point still stands) absolutely say no the US House primary must be held on the 28th, the filing deadline has already passed yada yada yada

Nope, because by virtue of delaying the primary, the filing deadline, and petition gathering will be delayed pari-passu. In fact, in state court, parties have intervened to clarify that issue.

[Torie]

Mr. Dunn was made aware of the comments above, and understands them (a couple of them may even have perhaps some merit), and is confident, very confident, that the Special Master will draw a fair map. However, one comment that puzzles him (in particular the bit in bold), no matter how many times that he reads it:

"A good map should have a relatively equal number of competitive seats on both sides with a slight skew towards the majority party."

[Torie]

Mr. Dunn is not here, but I know he bears AOC no malice. I would not however fret too much about that. Justice will be done, all will be happy (except the partisan hacks), and there will be great rejoicing. There is not long to wait now for the coming of the promise land.

[Torie]

https://mobile.twitter.com/NickReisman/status/1524404036841218049
Statehouse maps upheld.

Nope, they can still be challenged I think in a separate lawsuit. I presume in fact that there might now be a venue shopping race to the court house in fact. But the illegal maps are in place for 2022.

I was shocked to read the other day, that the Democrats shopped the idea of all the Congresspeople being elected at large because there was no time left to redraw the maps (really?). That idea was struck down by SCOTUS eons ago. One can almost smell the fear in some quarters.

[Torie]

As the clock winds down to the witching hour, it is interesting how so much turns on whether NY-03 crosses the Long Island sound into Westchester or not. The Pubs said no, don't go there, so the Pubs chopped NY-04 into Queens and then Brooklyn, driving one of the Dem lawyers into a white rage of anger. Another map, drawn by one Mr. Prieve, did a huge clockwise turn of the map so that via the Staten Island ferry, one goes from Staten Island to downtown Manhattan, making NY-11 forever non competitive, to effect the same objective. I strongly doubt either approach will be adopted. Finally, there is a  beautiful and elegant way, alluded to, albeit with the percentages wrong, in the Dunn submission, as to how to get NY-14's Hispanic percentage up, not just a little bit up, but up over 50% up, it turns out. I think I know, where this is all likely to go, but we shall see.

Mr. Dunn tells me that he had a grand time in Bath, and the pack really enjoyed the splendid countryside, and the discovery of an absolutely awesome new dog park in Oneonta. One nice lady in the park actually already knew about the concept of crack and pack, and wanted to know more. Imagine that?

[Torie]

Did mr.dunn visit the glass museum ?

Mr. Dunn did that several years ago, and he highly recommends it. And unlike the disheveled looking Bath (none of the Court staff lives there they tell me), Corning's Main Street and environs is as cute as a button.

[Torie]

Sorry you could not make it to Queens. That was an interesting experience.

[Torie]

I fixed the AOC seat (and the numbering system), and  we shall see if that fix was adopted today. I think I also have determined what the loadstar of your map was, which perhaps explains all those extra chops. That is all I am going to say.  

Oh, one other thing. SCOTUS may invoke ISLD, and exclude courts from drawing maps, including inter alia the NC map, and throw it into the dumpster, never to be seen again. I have said before, and say again, that redistricting brings out the worst in people.


https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/have-the-courts-made-gerrymandering-better-or-worse/

As to Queens, I had to endure once again listening to the Intervenors' lawyer for the group that wanted to toss the Assembly maps for this election cycle (they lost) go on and on and on and on, this time for the purpose soliciting clients. I finally interrupted him and asked him if he planned to finish that evening or go into the morning hours. Dan and I finally commenced to walk out, which did finally shut him up. Interesting crowd, to say the least.

Oh, I see the dude filed another lawsuit for his clients in Manhattan to toss the assembly maps. I asked him if that was the plan, and he dodged the question. At least his commute has been considerably shortened.

https://twitter.com/NickReisman/status/1526174001403514882?s=20&t=VkMj3lGThtZJAZtwLoFgbA

[Torie]

https://twitter.com/NYElectionNews/status/1526186498474778625
Waiting.

Inasmuch as it was posted in the morning, that squib contains no information actually. I am going to walk the dog. Cervas has a tough job drawing the state senate map with all those  arcane requirements that sent me screaming to the exits. So he might be under the gun. So it is time for the pack to go foraging.

At least for Congress, he has at least one splendid template to work from to save him a lot of time.

[Torie]

Cervas is kind of an old school neutral map drawer. It is the kind of map that I would have drawn 10 years ago. The metrics are:

1. Minimizing chops is job one.

to be continued ...

[Torie]

Cervas is kind of an old school neutral map drawer. It is the kind of map that I would have drawn 10 years ago. The metrics are:

1. Minimizing chops is job one.

to be continued ...

Torie, we love you but sometimes you need to take the L. Any truly neutral map would have a Trump seat for NY 19. And maybe an orthodox seat. Dems clearly got a break here

I know Cervas gave my map very serious consideration. There were a lot of competing considerations to balance. (Losing that extra seat in south Brooklyn makes the map so much cleaner, and in that sense he did go on a variation of the the Prieve theme.)  And it is tough to know what is a truly competitive seat in some places, given that the swing was so big going to both directions between Trump 2016 and 2020. I do take some credit for the emphasis on competitive seats (per my letter and court presentation where they both were nodding vigorously when I emphasized that issue).

Personally, I like the map for selfish reasons, because in so many seats, a MAGA can't win, and a bold progressive can't win, and thus we may see a resurgence of moderates being elected from both parties. Both parties by and large utterly repel me these days. I don't feel represented, at all.

I think he also pushed NY-21 way south to put the entirety of Tompkins in NY-19 in a clean way, after my rant against Common Cause for the way they did it.

I hope to write a letter to the court saying I think I understand what he did and respect it, even though I failed to give birth to that south Brooklyn seat that should have been drawn not only now, but 10 years ago.

I wonder if he will write a report explaining what he did and file it today or tomorrow morning. He is probably under the gun finishing the State Senate map.

[Torie]

Can someone explain to me a few things:

How come Wasserman thinks this is terrible for D’s yet Cohn thinks it’s great for Dems (and so do some posters here)

Ignorance and bias, but I assume you already knew that pundits in the public square tend to survive based on the thoughts of others. If they had their own horsepower, they would be doing something else. Next!

[Torie]

That’s a moderate win for Dems though I don’t get why they did that to Buffalo.

Isn't splitting up the Buffalo metro good from a competitive seat POV?

No such seat in the area exists. The chop is minor and was done to make the map more compact overall, and keep chops to an absolute minimum. Cervas does not put as much emphasis as I do on avoiding tri-chopping counties.

[Torie]

That’s a moderate win for Dems though I don’t get why they did that to Buffalo.

Isn't splitting up the Buffalo metro good from a competitive seat POV?

No such seat in the area exists. The chop is minor and was done to make the map more compact overall, and keep chops to an absolute minimum. Cervas does not put as much emphasis as I do on avoiding tri-chopping counties.

I was talking more about how any CD centered firmly on the Buffalo metro alone would probably be Dem. By splitting the metro in two, you likely get two competitive districts.

Nope.

[Torie]

Here are the stats using PVI as Cervas did (a metric that has its pluses and minuses). I tend to believe that I had a key influence in maximizing the number of competitive districts, however you define that, which is tough. But given the toxic environment for Dems due to issues concerning inflation, higher income educated centrists who are liberal on social issues, may come home to the GOP if they nominate Katko rather than Tenney types, in which event if that happened this map could be Gotterdamerung for the Dems in 2022. The devil is in the details, and already some political apple carts have been upset. That is another thing I think I had some influence perhaps in putting the care and feeding of incumbents on ignore.

Yes, the Asians and Orthodox Jews were screwed in south Brooklyn, but I think I understand why. I will flesh this out more in my letter to the Court, and ask Cervas for further explanation.
I admire him and expect that he will provide it.

[Torie]

Torie  you say Cervantes tried to avoid county chops but I think the goal was make a reasonable map with as many dem favorable decisions as reasonably possible.
Proof ?
Check out Albany County in the state senate map. He chops it despite it being 98.5% of a district and adds deep red Montgomery to unpack it  while making the Rensselaer district more D along with helping out the Saratoga district with Schnetenady

i have not reviewed the State Senate map. Do the Dems have a reasonably safe two thirds majority in the State Senate from his map? That is where the rubber meets the road. How many competitive seats did he draw? Did he make a claim as to that with the State Senate map? Is the SS map put up on the Court site?

[Torie]

I have always had a low opinion of Wasserman:

[Torie]

https://twitter.com/BenJ_Rosenblatt/status/1527098981628710912?s=20&t=t0-txa...
GOP submitted "adjustments" map. Kinda repeats what I have said, and how drawing the Orthodox seat harms the minority seats, in this case the Central Brooklyn Hispanic seat.

No, one can protect all of the existing minority seats, as well as an Orthodox Jewish seat with a max Asian percentage. We shall see.

[Torie]

You heard it here first, I promise you. I was wondering how McAllister could rule on a map today, particularly given that Cervas needs to prepare a report, and there have been an avalanche of comments, every one of which Cervas reads and has said that he will consider. From all of that McAllister himself may request changes. I believe he has the final say, not Cervas. So when he considers relief to some intervenors as to calendar issues, he mentions that it is possible the map might not be adopted by his own May 20 deadline. And he mentions that prospect on - you guessed it, May 20. If I were a betting man, it ain't happening today. And the odds that there will be some map changes just went up.

[Torie]

And below is Mr. Dunn's last gasp to try to forge a south Brooklyn CD with his own two bare hands. He hopes that if a miracle does not happen, that the "Report" will explain why that quite compelling COI was constrained to get the short end of the stick for two redistricting cycles in a row. Dr. Cervas and the Judge know what Mr. Dunn wants. He has told them more than once. That said Mr. Dunn tells me that he  very much likes the SM.

https://davesredistricting.org/join/899a90fa-ef84-4ac8-b8a5-d28026836017

One can see that such a CD can be given birth while minorities not only prosper and thrive, but actually get close to the max. Praise the Lord.