2020 Census and Redistricting Thread: Minnesota

[Sol]

Is Minnesota certain to lose a district? I thought that wasn't completely baked in.

[Sol]

The question is whether the DFL want a secure 4-3 or are happy with a 3-1-3, with the 2nd as a swing seat trending mildly Democratic. You can shift that into lean bordering on likely D territory without needing particularly ugly lines. There's pretty much no chance that the 3rd won't be made safe, though.

I wonder if the DFL might choose to give Craig the safe seat rather than Phillips, since she seems like a weaker candidate.

[Sol]

I'm not sure if Scott County is really a great fit with Dakota County--maybe some of the more Minneapolis-y parts like Apple Valley or w/e but isn't the bulk of Dakota more St. Paul oriented?

[Sol]

Is that meant to be a fair map? If so I imagine the Minnesotans are all collectively exploding their heads at the Mpls.-St. Paul district.

[Sol]

Sad.

That's a really superb map--it's frustrating that a district combining the St. Paul suburbia and the Minneapolis suburbia has to be drawn, but after criticizing someone else's map for it earlier it became clear when I played with the boundaries myself that it's impossible to avoid.

The only nitpick I have is that Chisago and Isanti might be better fits in the Blue seat--they're kind of exurban Minneapolis zones like Sherburne.

If one was doing a California-style map which elevates CoI over county lines, I might would trade territory to put Elk River in the purple--but that's probably not the right approach for Minnesota.

[Sol]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manomin_County,_Minnesota

By the way  if anyone is wondering here is some history about Anoka county that creates the divide between that super inner ring suburban part and then the exurban/rural portion of the county.

That's pretty interesting--I wonder if any of the folks in that portion have even considered seceding.

[Sol]

In fairness Crow Wing is home to Brainerd, which is one of the main towns of Northern Minnesota--the kind of place where farmers might go to buy Christmas presents or spare parts or whatever.

My hometown of Boone is a similar place and the county has a similar population relative to its geographic size/hinterland.

[Sol]

Is the Hmong community in Minneapolis even that big? The Asian population is only about 6% in Mpls., and that's not all going to be Hmong.

[Sol]

The best argument against a unified MSP district I've seen in this thread is literally "it's never been done before."  Maintaining existing district alignment (i.e., "minimal change") can be a good, neutral map criterion in the absence of other concerns.  However, I never (for some unfathomable reason?) see red avatars in the GA thread complaining about an ATL district that combines Decatur, Druid Hills, Buckhead, Dunwoody and Johns Creek to create a majority "White liberal" district when these cities have literally never been together in a CD before.  Keeping MSP and St. Paul separate has the effect of allowing the cities to dominate 2/7 (~30%) of Minnesota's congressional delegation despite being only 13% of the statewide population.  13% is almost exactly what you need for a single district in MN (1/7 = ~14.3%.)  Keeping them separate produces bad results     

This is interesting because I actually agree-redistricters actually do give way too much deference to precedent, often to the point of idiocy--see the CT or KY lines, or the unbearable wholeness of Bucks County.

However, that's not really the justification for separating Minneapolis and St. Paul. The two clearly identify as pretty distinct from each other, and it's not right to ignore that by concern trolling as a proxy for making the districts as more Republican.

[Sol]

Was looking at the demographics of Brooklyn Center since it was discussed in the thread. The white flight it experienced in the 2000s is absolutely astonishing--71% to 49% White!

[Sol]

IMO Pine County is probably the best place to split between the great northern and St. Cloudish district, unless there's a county with more internally distinct communities of interest.

[Sol]

The panel is also required to adopt a least-change map. They have no authority to impose political judgment when they are only correcting for too many districts and population equality. When you lose a district, least-change is not necessarily little-change.

The panel will accept my proposal for the three outstate districts. The only reasonable complaint is splitting the St. Cloud on the county line/Mississippi River. This can be remedied by including the east bank portions of St. Cloud in MN-7, and putting Wadena back in MN-6 where it currently is (MN-8 2010).

How tremendously arrogant.

[Sol]

Just why are the usual suspects of mapping nerds more obsessed by Minnesota than any other state this cycle? Inquiring minds want to know!

Well, it's losing a seat and the prospect of a Minneapolis-St. Paul district is a fun opportunity for partisan trolling.

Plus I think there's something to the fact that drawing Minnesota is easy--the population distribution divides pretty cleanly so it's not challenging to make good districts, unlike, say, NC or OH.

[Sol]

Just why are the usual suspects of mapping nerds more obsessed by Minnesota than any other state this cycle? Inquiring minds want to know!

Well, it's losing a seat and the prospect of a Minneapolis-St. Paul district is a fun opportunity for partisan trolling.

Plus I think there's something to the fact that drawing Minnesota is easy--the population distribution divides pretty cleanly so it's not challenging to make good districts, unlike, say, NC or OH.

I don't see how Jim  is being partisan here. He drew 4 Clinton seats in the area for his final map.

It's more of a 'trigger the libs' argument--it used to also advantage Republicans but not as much these days depending on the map.

[Sol]

I doubt Ilhan Omar wants to take a heaping pile of Anoka County, which would vote against her in a primary. And she's very much part of the DFL establishment, so her opinion matters to map drawers unlike AOC.

[Sol]

Even if there are fewer Democrats in Anoka County (and there are still plenty, especially these days), it seems plausible IMO that recently flipped Democrats in outer suburbs would be more against Omar than rock ribbed white liberals in inner suburbs and minority communities in Brooklyn Park.

[Sol]

I mean, after looking that map by Dr RI I am more convinced than on a map purely and exclusively based on COIs, the way to go would be to merge the twin cities.

How exactly are you determining CoIs lol? Communities of interest are generally determined by the perspective of the people who live there, and the horrified reaction of our Minnesotan posters is probably most indicative.

[Sol]

Colin Peterson appears to be totally clueless about the process, and what Court's do in the case a map cannot be passed, and they have to draw the map. Or perhaps he has not been informed that MN is retaining 8 CD's. Sad!

It looks like from the URL this was a quote from a Politico story in January, so it’s not so bad for him.

Indeed. Unfair in fact. It was expected that MN would probably lose a seat, and quite possible in that event that his former CD would be sliced and diced. That is certainly what my maps did!

MN keeping the 8th is the biggest surprise from the apportionment numbers, leaving aside RI keeping its 2nd.

You think the VRA requires something erose, when a CD drawn pursuant to neutral redistricting principles just happens to pack? The issue is that the real estate is empty around the RGV population nodes. I have never read anything under section 2 that suggests that you have to draw something that looks like a clear gerrymander to reduce packing. The only possible exception to some degree would be where Gingles triggers the need for another performing minority CD. It is also not clear at all that you need to draw something in clearly excess of 50% HCVAP, particularly via gerrymandering, solely because it is still not performing due to low Hispanic turnout. Finally, if RGV Hispanics continue to cast 40%+ for GOP candidates, it seems reasonably likely to me that Section 2 and Gingles will cease to apply to the area at all.

Hey, and then  maybe it would come back if RGV Hispanics start voting heavily GOP ala the Miami area Hispanics, and the Dems want to slice and dice them, so that the white wokesters in Austin can dominate the RGV - LULAC in reverse. 

Did you mean this for a different thread?

[Sol]

If Minnesota had lost a congressional seat as it almost did, which party likely would have lost the seat?

A fair map would be 4D-3R, but most compact configurations ended up at 4R-3D from my playing around so hard to say.

If reasonable configurations end up as 4R-3D, is 4D-3R really fair?

[Sol]

1. "reasonably compact" reminds me of your "fair map" Dane County split. You're not fooling anyone by describing your maps incorrectly (and why are you trying to? This is an internet forum). Call a spade a spade and say that you drew a tendril 4 way-Hennepin split.

This is an obvious pizzamander and isn't compact at all.

No, I know it's not compact on the whole at all. What I meant was, it is comparatively compact using Discovolante's district as a point of reference (shown below). Obviously I can't say any of those 6 seats are really compact at all, but they are most certainly more compact than the map below, and that is what I was talking about (though I can see why it might be confusing/unclear).

(Also, to NC Conservative, regarding the Dane County map - give me the link to the map I called fair, and I will tell you exactly why it is. Don't know which map you're talking about until you do, though, because I believe I've shared multiple maps here with Dane County separated.)

With that said, below is the map I was comparing mine to, and that's why I said it was (comparatively) compact:

Why is it so hard to draw 5 democratic CDs in a biden +8 state. The Nevada democrats did it in a biden +2 state

look on my works, ye mighty, and despair



(this still votes right of the state at large and trends are awful outside of Rochester so this would probably be fairly comfortably GOP-held in practice)

2. Use DRA. No one wants to use a clunkier site that lacks recent data.

I don't care for DRA's layout and much prefer that of Districtr's, even if it lacks a lot of information DRA has. Appreciate the advice/command but at least for the moment, I don't intend to switch to DRA.

No map that splits Dane County is fair. Even if you're aiming for proportionality, it is too clear of a community of interest for a split of it to be anything other than an egregious gerrymander.

Again - which map are you discussing? You give me the link of the so-called gerrymander, and I'll give you an explanation as to why splitting Dane County is justified.

No map that splits Dane County is fair. Pick any map as you like -- no map that splits Dane is fair.

I could maybe see some sort of argument if a split of one of the counties in the area was necessary for population equality, but yeah, there's basically zero region to do a split that goes deeper than one or two towns. Cracking Dane County to counteract Democratic packing is a scandalous gerrymander.