2020 Census and Redistricting Thread: New Jersey

[lfromnj]

NJ redistricting isn't done by a trifecta. Its a bipartisan commission. At the very least expect Van Drew's/ Smith to keep an R seat. The main question is what happens with North Jersey.

[Born to Slay. Forced to Work.]

NJ redistricting isn't done by a trifecta. Its a bipartisan commission. At the very least expect Van Drew's/ Smith to keep an R seat. The main question is what happens with North Jersey.

I’ve been working under the assumption dems get ruthless and abolish commissions where they can do they can fix the maps for as many seats for themselves as possible. Ya know what republicans have been doing

[lfromnj]

NJ redistricting isn't done by a trifecta. Its a bipartisan commission. At the very least expect Van Drew's/ Smith to keep an R seat. The main question is what happens with North Jersey.

I’ve been working under the assumption dems get ruthless and abolish commissions where they can do they can fix the maps for as many seats for themselves as possible. Ya know what republicans have been doing

And that would require a constitutional  amendment in NJ which will not happen. Even if the Electorate voted for it you couldn't redistrict till 2022.

[Sol]

In fairness the redistricting process in NJ isn't especially fair--judges select the preferred map from ones presented by the Dems and Reps IIRC.

[lfromnj]

In fairness the redistricting process in NJ isn't especially fair--judges select the preferred map from ones presented by the Dems and Reps IIRC.

It goes to a tiebreaker, relatively similar to AZ. IIRC D's got the legislative gerrymander to a degree while R's got the congressional dummymander due to Christy pressure.

[lfromnj]

Anyway cleaned up my earlier mess to give more respect to most of counties for a possible commission map. Besides a few thousand people Atlantic and Burlington are kept whole. Mercer is split for smith although his party is fairly swingy.

[Mr.Phips]

In fairness the redistricting process in NJ isn't especially fair--judges select the preferred map from ones presented by the Dems and Reps IIRC.

It goes to a tiebreaker, relatively similar to AZ. IIRC D's got the legislative gerrymander to a degree while R's got the congressional dummymander due to Christy pressure.

Couldn’t Dems have refused to allow a former Republican to be the tiebreaker in NJ?

[lfromnj]

In fairness the redistricting process in NJ isn't especially fair--judges select the preferred map from ones presented by the Dems and Reps IIRC.

It goes to a tiebreaker, relatively similar to AZ. IIRC D's got the legislative gerrymander to a degree while R's got the congressional dummymander due to Christy pressure.

Couldn’t Dems have refused to allow a former Republican to be the tiebreaker in NJ?

They could have but I think in exchange they got the legislative gerrymander?

[S019]

NJ redistricting isn't done by a trifecta. Its a bipartisan commission. At the very least expect Van Drew's/ Smith to keep an R seat. The main question is what happens with North Jersey.

At this point I feel pretty confident in 2-1 D North Jersey, I think 3 D's is a. a dummymander and b. would get strong opposition from the Reps on the commission, and 2-1 R is probably a dummymander, especially with how Morris and Bergen are shifting, and the Democrats would never allow it. 2-1 gives the GOP a sink that should be safe and that makes them happy and the Democrats keep 2 of their incumbents happy.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

In fairness the redistricting process in NJ isn't especially fair--judges select the preferred map from ones presented by the Dems and Reps IIRC.

It goes to a tiebreaker, relatively similar to AZ. IIRC D's got the legislative gerrymander to a degree while R's got the congressional dummymander due to Christy pressure.

Couldn’t Dems have refused to allow a former Republican to be the tiebreaker in NJ?

They could have but I think in exchange they got the legislative gerrymander?

Wouldn't surprise me, given this is New Jersey.

[Born to Slay. Forced to Work.]

NJ redistricting isn't done by a trifecta. Its a bipartisan commission. At the very least expect Van Drew's/ Smith to keep an R seat. The main question is what happens with North Jersey.

At this point I feel pretty confident in 2-1 D North Jersey, I think 3 D's is a. a dummymander and b. would get strong opposition from the Reps on the commission, and 2-1 R is probably a dummymander, especially with how Morris and Bergen are shifting, and the Democrats would never allow it. 2-1 gives the GOP a sink that should be safe and that makes them happy and the Democrats keep 2 of their incumbents happy.

You can see my map earlier in the thread which had a relatively safe 2-1 south Jersey map. The seat that was van Drew’s I made D+4, while keeping Norcross in a safe seat

[Torie]

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Pretty decent neutral map. I like it.

[S019]

This is probably more or less what a fair map is, but I think this is illegal. A lot of white liberals in places like Livingston and Montclair seem to have been thrown into the VRA AA seat, so the percentage there might be too low. Also this would never pass, because a bunch of incumbents were drawn out of their seats (Pallone and either Gottheimer or Sherrill definitely were), but I think this is meant to be a fair map anyways. Do you have demographic numbers for 2 and 6, given 2 is definitely a protected AA seat and 6 is either a protected Hispanic seat or a Hispanic opportunity seat?

[Torie]

Are you referring to state law or federal VRA law? There is no such thing under federal law as a minority opportunity CD. What you do need to do is avoid gerrymandering to pack a minority or dilute it. The Newark based CD in a Dem primary would have a majority of AA voters, or very close to it. It should be performing for a candidate of the AA's choice.

Aside from state law, personally I think in places where voting is less and less racially driven, as long as you don't gerrymander, or ignore a situation where there is a compact CD that is not performing for a minority and can be in theory pushed up to a majority minority CD in a primary, the VRA is on the way out, and SCOTUS should make that clear soon, to the extent it is not already.

I realized last night that the CD crossing the state from the ocean to the Delaware River  over the empty Pine Barrens and a county line was bad, and so first thing this morning I fixed the south Jersey lines.

As you might surmise, I drew the lines totally unaware of the partisan implications. I do not have a granular knowledge of Jersey politics. It seems pretty fluid actually, as one might expect for a state that in many ways is one big suburb.

[Brittain33]

That NJ-7 is possibly the worst-smelling district in the country without a hog CAFO.

[Torie]

That NJ-7 is possibly the worst-smelling district in the country without a hog CAFO.

Driving down the Jersey coast is a life adventure that still awaits me. So far, I have not gone south of Jersey City. I had planned before I found out that 2020 was the year of most interesting times for me, to venture south through Bayonne, Statin Island, and then though the olfactory zone to which you refer, and spend the night at a gay bed and breakfast in Asbury Park. Perhaps when I and my partner are all vaccinated up, I will do that in early Spring before the beach mob infests the place. I doubt that the zone to which you refer will match the smell I experienced when knee high to a grasshopper in Phoenix in the late summer when it gets somewhat humid of all things, when its stockyards were at full throttle. That was just amazing.

[muon2]

Did you copy the CVAPs, too? Those are what the court would look at for minority performance. They'd probably want some recent elections by precinct, too, to demonstrate that they can elect their preferred candidate, but I think that goes beyond the tools in DRA.

[Torie]

You can get to about 40% Hispanic CVAP by taking in the north side of Newark (where have all the Italians gone, long time passing?), or Elizabeth. Even by trying to take in both, and making some erose mess that carves out the gold coast, you are not going to get to more than say 45% HCVAP.  It may be legal to do the erose mess, but it is certainly not VRA required.

I might add that a substantial percentage of the Hispanics in the zone are Cuban, and thus about a quarter of them or so vote Pub (it will be interesting to find out what the Trump 2020 share turns out to be). It is just not there. I really think Hispanics and the VRA are on its last legs. That may be one of the very few silver linings of the Trump show. He has reduced the salience of color as a proxy for partisan preference.

[muon2]

You can get to about 40% Hispanic CVAP by taking in the north side of Newark (where have all the Italians gone, long time passing?), or Elizabeth. Even by trying to take in both, and making some erose mess that carves out the gold coast, you are not going to get to more than say 45% HCVAP.  It may be legal to do the erose mess, but it is certainly not VRA required.

I might add that a substantial percentage of the Hispanics in the zone are Cuban, and thus about a quarter of them or so vote Pub (it will be interesting to find out what the Trump 2020 share turns out to be). It is just not there. I really think Hispanics and the VRA are on its last legs. That may be one of the very few silver linings of the Trump show. He has reduced the salience of color as a proxy for partisan preference.

I'm surprised the Black CVAP grew so little in CD 2 compared to the total pop. I'm used to Chicago where in areas on the border between Blacks and Hispanics the Black increase is usually more substantial.

[S019]

You can get to about 40% Hispanic CVAP by taking in the north side of Newark (where have all the Italians gone, long time passing?), or Elizabeth. Even by trying to take in both, and making some erose mess that carves out the gold coast, you are not going to get to more than say 45% HCVAP.  It may be legal to do the erose mess, but it is certainly not VRA required.

I might add that a substantial percentage of the Hispanics in the zone are Cuban, and thus about a quarter of them or so vote Pub (it will be interesting to find out what the Trump 2020 share turns out to be). It is just not there. I really think Hispanics and the VRA are on its last legs. That may be one of the very few silver linings of the Trump show. He has reduced the salience of color as a proxy for partisan preference.

44% is probably not good enough, especially if you consider the fact that you can make a much stronger seat and given only one seat is mandated, there really isn't justification for a weaker seat, and again even if it might legal taking away the Hispanic opportunity seat is not something that a fair map would do, as minority representation also matters on a fair map.

[SevenEleven]

Fair Map^TM

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Not sure what I'd call this map, I suppose it is a fair map in the lfromnj sense of the word?
The main thrust of it is county integrity I guess.
I have two compact performing majority-minority seats, and one white plurality seat. I created a whole Northern Jersey CD formed of Sussex, Warren, and Morris counties.
I really like my 9th. Combined with the 8th (which only takes Elizabeth to keep performing, and is otherwise contained with Essex and Hudson) and the 10th (similarly contained within those two counties), and the fact that Morris, Sussex, and Warren together form a whole count CD, I think the overall result is quite nice.
https://davesredistricting.org/join/0e8b0804-fadc-4670-8233-bc0d21682e25

[lfromnj]

Not sure what I'd call this map, I suppose it is a fair map in the lfromnj sense of the word?
The main thrust of it is county integrity I guess.
I have two compact performing majority-minority seats, and one white plurality seat. I created a whole Northern Jersey CD formed of Sussex, Warren, and Morris counties.
I really like my 9th. Combined with the 8th (which only takes Elizabeth to keep performing, and is otherwise contained with Essex and Hudson) and the 10th (similarly contained within those two counties), and the fact that Morris, Sussex, and Warren together form a whole count CD, I think the overall result is quite nice.
https://davesredistricting.org/join/0e8b0804-fadc-4670-8233-bc0d21682e25

I would do a rotation between 5 and 9 to have 5 take in South Bergen so 9 can take in Western Bergen although that might ruin compactness due to the weird shape of Passiac. Other than that for a county integrity map its not bad for NJ. NJ counties are actually pretty important COI's really but the problem is its a state with only 21 counties but has 12 districts.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Not sure what I'd call this map, I suppose it is a fair map in the lfromnj sense of the word?
The main thrust of it is county integrity I guess.
I have two compact performing majority-minority seats, and one white plurality seat. I created a whole Northern Jersey CD formed of Sussex, Warren, and Morris counties.
I really like my 9th. Combined with the 8th (which only takes Elizabeth to keep performing, and is otherwise contained with Essex and Hudson) and the 10th (similarly contained within those two counties), and the fact that Morris, Sussex, and Warren together form a whole count CD, I think the overall result is quite nice.
https://davesredistricting.org/join/0e8b0804-fadc-4670-8233-bc0d21682e25

I would do a rotation between 5 and 9 to have 5 take in South Bergen so 9 can take in Western Bergen.

Is this a revision suggestion or a statement on how you'd draw it? If it's the former, I don't think I could get behind that, since it would harm compactness.