Colorado 2020 U.S. House Redistricting Discussion

[patzer]

It's likely some combination of:

- Wanting to preserve the Geographic communities of interest around Colorado's three largest cities. For example, when we starting this whole process one of the first comments frequently presented to the commission was to leave Aurora whole. When you do this, it becomes preferable to not link the city with the north suburbs across rural Adams or the airport, but with those to her south or west. The first draft plan, the one that wrenched Ft. Collins our of Larimar, was very similar to a CLLARO map, but one of the changes made was removing the Colorado Springs arm/cut.

It's quite possible to link Aurora with the north while still looking reasonable, imo (e.g. as in my map a few posts up)

- The commission is a multipartisan body and the views and votes of everyone must be taken into account. The commissions map also should try and reflect the partisan lean of the state, and carving up Denver usually leads to cascading issues that violate both points. At it's most simple, Taking all of Denver's minorities out - both those by the Airport and those in the SW - leaves the remaining district to be paired with Arapahoe and then Douglas, areas that gradually lose a shared identity with White urbanites. The ripple effects can leave a map that at times is gerrymandered for the Dems, so good luck getting a meaningful amount of commissioner votes for that.

This however does make a lot of sense and I wouldn't be surprised if it's a big factor- every map I see that involves splitting Denver significantly just naturally favours the Dems. Really you've got a situation where it can take a bit of effort to maintain three Republican seats thanks to the geography.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

The only reason not to split Denver and make a compact majority Hispanic seat including Denver area and Greeley Hispanics (as well as to include Colorado Springs Hispanic areas in the southern district to make that seat be majority-minority) is systemic racism and white supremacy.

If the CO Supreme Court doesn't intervene and ensure that minority voting rights are respected through the creation of two majority-minority seats in this manner, then minorities will have every justification to riot and trash Republican-leaning white supremacist areas of the state, until the government rejects white supremacy and changes its ways.

[LimoLiberal]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FvImmsX6bk

SCOC arguments are ongoing.

[Skill and Chance]

So the commission just approved its state legislative maps and it went very differently.  The new maps are likely Dem supermajorities in both chambers.  Weird.

[lfromnj]

So the commission just approved its state legislative maps and it went very differently.  The new maps are likely Dem supermajorities in both chambers.  Weird.

Definitely seems like the CO legislative commission went higher on "competitive districts"

[Skill and Chance]

So the commission just approved its state legislative maps and it went very differently.  The new maps are likely Dem supermajorities in both chambers.  Weird.

Definitely seems like the CO legislative commission went higher on "competitive districts"

CO seems like the only place so far where Dems lost vs. expectations at the congressional level but won vs. expectations at the legislative level?

[Non Swing Voter]

CO seems to be trending left so fast that I wouldn't be surprised if some of this discussion is outdated in 5 years.  It might not help Dems in 2022 though.

CO was probably Biden's biggest over performance of 2020.

[lfromnj]

CO seems to be trending left so fast that I wouldn't be surprised if some of this discussion is outdated in 5 years.  It might not help Dems in 2022 though.

CO was probably Biden's biggest over performance of 2020.

The swing district is the most stable though atleast relative to 2012 . Obama won it by 8 points  Trump won it by 2..  Biden only won it by 4.5. It could  definitely trend  left with Colorado but  it is a wait and watch. Obviously this all depends on the CO court not striking down the map.

[Non Swing Voter]

CO seems to be trending left so fast that I wouldn't be surprised if some of this discussion is outdated in 5 years.  It might not help Dems in 2022 though.

CO was probably Biden's biggest over performance of 2020.

The swing district is the most stable though atleast relative to 2012 . Obama won it by 8 points  Trump won it by 2..  Biden only won it by 4.5. It could  definitely trend  left with Colorado but  it is a wait and watch. Obviously this all depends on the CO court not striking down the map.

I think swing districts tend to be this way because both parties put so much investment into it that they both turn out their voters and you don't get lopsided swings. 

[lfromnj]

https://twitter.com/subspaceteatime/status/1448850280930418693

https://twitter.com/subspaceteatime/status/1448850280930418693

[If my soul was made of stone]

Greeley Derangement Syndrome appears to be terminal.

[lfromnj]

Interestingly the Colorado GOP is fine with the legislative maps as well.

[It's not just that you are a crook senator]

I love how "independent" redistricting is basically a republican gerrymander across many states.

[Skill and Chance]

I love how "independent" redistricting is basically a republican gerrymander across many states.

I don't agree with this.  The new CO legislative maps are very Dem- 2/3rds Dem majorities in both chambers in an average year.  The current CA and AZ maps are very Dem. 

[MaxQue]

I love how "independent" redistricting is basically a republican gerrymander across many states.

In Colorado, in fact, it ended as a Republican gerrymanderer for Congress, and a Democrat one for the State House and Senate.

[Skill and Chance]

I love how "independent" redistricting is basically a republican gerrymander across many states.

In Colorado, in fact, it ended as a Republican gerrymanderer for Congress, and a Democrat one for the State House and Senate.

The same thing happened in NJ in 2011, but they put politicians on the commission and use a single tiebreaker, so it's always a gerrymander for one side or the other depending on the tiebreaker.  It's really odd that this happened on a commission of private citizens with a supermajority requirement. 

[lfromnj]

Then again the CO GOP seems fine with the legislative maps and the congressional maps really aren't an R gerrymander. I don't get where this idea comes from. The only arguable way it makes it an R gerrymander is I guess Boebert gets 1 point more R seat than she should have and Perlmutter does get a borderline swingy CD but still pretty Safe. The new seat is basically where it should be in partisanship. It is just a bad map.

An  actual R leaning commission map would have involved Larimer and Weld + Fort Morgan being a seat.

[Oryxslayer]

Then again the CO GOP seems fine with the legislative maps and the congressional maps really aren't an R gerrymander. I don't get where this idea comes from. The only arguable way it makes it an R gerrymander is I guess Boebert gets 1 point more R seat than she should have and Perlmutter does get a borderline swingy CD but still pretty Safe. The new seat is basically where it should be in partisanship. It is just a bad map.

An  actual R leaning commission map would have involved Larimer and Weld + Fort Morgan being a seat.

Yeah the congressional map isn't a partisan gerrymander - its within the range of outcomes producible by such a body. It is just a geographic mess that either draws seats without COIs (e.g. CO-07 sprawling from the suburbs to the southern ranchlands) or seats that fail to reflect their stated COI (e.g. CO-08 being majority white).

[lfromnj]

The final 12-member commission will have 4 Democrats, 4 Republicans, and 4 unaffiliated members, unless another political party becomes the largest or second largest political party in the state. The final composition of the commission should reflect Colorado’s racial, ethnic, gender, and geographic diversity, and must include members from each congressional district, including at least one member from the Western Slope.

Wow I didn't know about requirement.

[Oryxslayer]

And it's legal, even though the court doesn't appear to like it.

[Stuart98]

Ugh, would have preferred a less weird map, w/e I guess.

[BoiseBoy]

Congratulations to Colorado. State #7 to finish its maps.

[Oryxslayer]

Ugh, would have preferred a less weird map, w/e I guess.

Blame for the weirdness can't be hoisted on any party, individual, or even the commission I feel. Blame goes to CLLARO.

CLLARO kept producing their own maps, which rightly sought to improve Hispanic access. However, the one sticking point they kept seemingly insisting on was that that Pueblo needed to be in a Dem seat, and they therefore produces some wild 'not-gerrymanders' to achieve that goal. I guess the reasoning was that it wasn't good eno0ugh for Pueblo Hispanic opportunity, they needed to be favored. Cuts in Colorado Springs, the Western Slope divided between two seats, these were things that were proposed. But they should have learned from the first Draft Map that the commission and respondents were unwilling to walk that path. If they had learned that lesson then other parts of the map would have more flexibility. Their seeming insistence on this point, despite commission opposition forced the commission into narrower and narrower selections of viable alternatives, forcing oddities to try and compromise between the desire to mess with CO-03 and the desire to maintain a recognizable district.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Well, that sucks. Oh well.

[lfromnj]

Any serious Latino Group would just create the Aurora Adam's district. None of them did and just were trying to create a 5 2 1 map.