2020 Census and Redistricting Thread: Mississippi

[Frodo]

In the wake of the recent Supreme Court ruling, with Texas, Louisiana, Georgia, North Carolina, and potentially other southern states with a relatively large African American minority population electing potentially an extra member of the Congressional Black Caucus, could we see Mississippi getting in on the action?  Could the Magnolia State get an extra BVAP congressional district?  

[TML]

In the wake of the recent Supreme Court ruling, with Texas, Louisiana, Georgia, North Carolina, and potentially other southern states with a relatively large African American minority population electing potentially an extra member of the Congressional Black Caucus, could we see Mississippi getting in on the action?  Could the Magnolia State get an extra BVAP congressional district?  

I'm not sure if it is possible to create two relatively compact BVAP districts in MS - back in 2018, when 538 released its "Atlas of Redistricting," the maps for MS showed that in order to create two BVAP districts in MS, many more counties would have to be split (15 vs 4) and the district shapes would be decidedly less compact compared to the actual 2010s map.

[Oryxslayer]

Highly likely the answer is no on impossibility,  but it is also no on legal grounds.  Mississippi is in the awkward spot where under Section 2 of the VRA nobody can justify giving African Americans 50% of the seats with 38% of the VAP, but if the state somehow got a 5th district it would be forced to be an access district under the same predicament. The issue of lines is the already alluded to, but one should also be aware that the polarization which occurs in 90% of the state necessitates access seats must often be 55% than 50%. Check out the turnout in 2022 for an example of why, likely since Mississippi has all its other relevant contests in odd-numbered years.

However,  there is already a suit in Federal court against the state legislature maps.  The plaintiffs here use section 2, on the Senate map most aggressively.  Keep an eye on it if you care about Mississippi,  the intention was to get relief before the upcoming elections.

[Stuart98]

In the wake of the recent Supreme Court ruling, with Texas, Louisiana, Georgia, North Carolina, and potentially other southern states with a relatively large African American minority population electing potentially an extra member of the Congressional Black Caucus, could we see Mississippi getting in on the action?  Could the Magnolia State get an extra BVAP congressional district?  

I'm not sure if it is possible to create two relatively compact BVAP districts in MS - back in 2018, when 538 released its "Atlas of Redistricting," the maps for MS showed that in order to create two BVAP districts in MS, many more counties would have to be split (15 vs 4) and the district shapes would be decidedly less compact compared to the actual 2010s map.

Two relatively compact districts is possible but you have to create additional county splits. You can get two majority BVAP districts with only four split counties (see this mess of a map) but it requires a compactness violation in at least two places (on this map, Madison County and Jones County). I'd hazard a guess that eight splits are required for two compact majority BVAP districts.