Why do Democrats allow an independent redistricting commission in California?

[Beet]

When they easily could draw a 53-0 or 52-0 (assuming they lose a district) map? Spare us the nonsense about principles, since Maryland is heavily gerrymandered. Besides, you can make a reasonable case that gerrymandering is necessary to offset the other side's gerrymandering, and that if Republicans drop theirs, Democrats will too. The Democrats love to complain about Republican gerrymandering, but to the Republicans' credit, they are relentless at pushing for their interests. The Democrats can't say the same.

[lfromnj]

I mean the West is very different from the East too, Idaho and Montana both have independent commissions, also AFAIK it requires another ballot commission to get rid of the commission in CA and its kinda tough to persuade the average man to increase political powers.

[Roll Roons]

They hold 45 out of 53 House seats and supermajorities in both Houses of the legislature, so it's not like it would make a huge difference.

Besides, there are other ways that one party can play dirty and rig things in their favor. Maryland and Illinois Democrats gerrymander congressional and legislative maps, as do Wisconsin and North Carolina Republicans, but California Democrats have opted to do it through ballot harvesting. A Republican leads on election night? Oh, we magically found thousands of extra ballots that broke 90% of the Democrat.

And before people accuse me of being a partisan hack, note who I'm endorsing for president.

[Zaybay]

Multiple reasons:

1. Its very difficult to get rid of the current commission. As Infromnj points out, the Democrats would need to push a ballot question to get rid of it, and its really hard to argue to the electorate that the state should go back to partisan gerrymandering.

2. Theres no real point in getting rid of the commission. The Democrats enjoy near total control of the state and hold 45/53 seats. Sure, the Democrats could get a couple extra seats, but is it really worth it to expand all the effort and money to push a ballot question that likely wont pass just so they have the ability to win 5 or 6 more seats?

3. Principles. The Democrats like the commission and non-partisan redistricting, simple as that. You bring up Maryland like its some silver bullet (even though its a mild gerrymander at best, the Dems could easily make a clean 8-0 map but chose not to due to incumbent demands), but if you look across the country, most Democratic politicians and voters want CA-style commissions. Hell, the VA Dems just largely gave up their power to control redistricting.

[Beet]

They hold 45 out of 53 House seats and supermajorities in both Houses of the legislature, so it's not like it would make a huge difference.

Besides, there are other ways that one party can play dirty and rig things in their favor. Maryland and Illinois Democrats gerrymander congressional and legislative maps, as do Wisconsin and North Carolina Republicans, but California Democrats have opted to do it through ballot harvesting. A Republican leads on election night? Oh, we magically found thousands of extra ballots that broke 90% of the Democrat.

And before people accuse me of being a partisan hack, note who I'm endorsing for president.

Seven or eight seats is a huge difference. The difference is the scale of California. There's no other state in the West of similar size to compare it to. It would be insane to imagine the Republicans voluntarily giving equal weight to Democrats on redistricting boards in Florida and Texas, for example. At the end of the day the Democrats complain about all sorts of things they have no control over, like the Electoral College, voter suppression, and gerrymandering, but when they do have the power to shift things in their interest, they never use it. That's the real problem.

[Coastal Elitist]

The people voted for it. Also I highly doubt that you could get a 52-0 map. Prior to the commission Democrats had gerrymandered the state and couldn't get anything even close to that.

[Beet]

Multiple reasons:

1. Its very difficult to get rid of the current commission. As Infromnj points out, the Democrats would need to push a ballot question to get rid of it, and its really hard to argue to the electorate that the state should go back to partisan gerrymandering.

There are easy arguments against it. For one, you can argue that nonpartisan redistricting should be done at the federal level, since Congress is a federal body. Being "nonpartisan" only in Democratic states while being partisan to the max in Republican states doesn't make much sense. It only effectively rewards and gives consent to Republican gerrymandering.

That being said, it seems there is a way around the commission by packing its members with those that represent the party. The Democrats did this in 2011, but they didn't draw 53-0 map. However, California is even more lopsided now than then, so they should try to.

2. Theres no real point in getting rid of the commission. The Democrats enjoy near total control of the state and hold 45/53 seats. Sure, the Democrats could get a couple extra seats, but is it really worth it to expand all the effort and money to push a ballot question that likely wont pass just so they have the ability to win 5 or 6 more seats?

I mean, given that 5 or 6 seats could effectively nullify Republican gerrymandering in an entire state like Georgia or North Carolina, the answer would be a resounding yes for Democrats.

3. Principles. The Democrats like the commission and non-partisan redistricting, simple as that. You bring up Maryland like its some silver bullet (even though its a mild gerrymander at best, the Dems could easily make a clean 8-0 map but chose not to due to incumbent demands), but if you look across the country, most Democratic politicians and voters want CA-style commissions. Hell, the VA Dems just largely gave up their power to control redistricting.

Maryland and it's ridiculous looking districts regularly makes the list of most gerrymandered states, even though the entire Eastern shore and Western Maryland are heavily Republican. If that's not gerrymandering, the Democrats will have to stop complaining about it altogether because it's certainly worse than anything the Republicans have done. As for Virginia, most Democrats actually opposed the amendment, which was supported mostly by Republicans. But it's telling again how, even in a hard won Democratic controlled House of Delegates, Republicans vote for their party interests while Democrats break ranks.

[lfromnj]

They hold 45 out of 53 House seats and supermajorities in both Houses of the legislature, so it's not like it would make a huge difference.

Besides, there are other ways that one party can play dirty and rig things in their favor. Maryland and Illinois Democrats gerrymander congressional and legislative maps, as do Wisconsin and North Carolina Republicans, but California Democrats have opted to do it through ballot harvesting. A Republican leads on election night? Oh, we magically found thousands of extra ballots that broke 90% of the Democrat.

And before people accuse me of being a partisan hack, note who I'm endorsing for president.

Why do Republicans get confused what Ballot harvesting and mail in vote counts are?
There is sometimes an intersection between the two but not always.

Ballot Harvesting is going house to house to collect mail in votes anytime before the election
Late vote counting is people being allowed to have postmarked ballots the day of the election and when they come in late they are still counted very lately . Both groups lean quite Democrat in normal circumstances.

[Donerail]

California Democrats have opted to do it through ballot harvesting. A Republican leads on election night? Oh, we magically found thousands of extra ballots that broke 90% of the Democrat.

And before people accuse me of being a partisan hack, note who I'm endorsing for president.

Why do you think promising to vote for Joe Biden would make people less annoyed by you making shit up?

[Sestak]

The people voted for it. Also I highly doubt that you could get a 52-0 map. Prior to the commission Democrats had gerrymandered the state and couldn't get anything even close to that.

The gerrymander in the 2000s was bipartisan incumbent protection...

[Zaybay]

Multiple reasons:

1. Its very difficult to get rid of the current commission. As Infromnj points out, the Democrats would need to push a ballot question to get rid of it, and its really hard to argue to the electorate that the state should go back to partisan gerrymandering.

There are easy arguments against it. For one, you can argue that nonpartisan redistricting should be done at the federal level, since Congress is a federal body. Being "nonpartisan" only in Democratic states while being partisan to the max in Republican states doesn't make much sense. It only effectively rewards and gives consent to Republican gerrymandering.

That being said, it seems there is a way around the commission by packing its members with those that represent the party. The Democrats did this in 2011, but they didn't draw 53-0 map. However, California is even more lopsided now than then, so they should try to.

2. Theres no real point in getting rid of the commission. The Democrats enjoy near total control of the state and hold 45/53 seats. Sure, the Democrats could get a couple extra seats, but is it really worth it to expand all the effort and money to push a ballot question that likely wont pass just so they have the ability to win 5 or 6 more seats?

I mean, given that 5 or 6 seats could effectively nullify Republican gerrymandering in an entire state like Georgia or North Carolina, the answer would be a resounding yes for Democrats.

3. Principles. The Democrats like the commission and non-partisan redistricting, simple as that. You bring up Maryland like its some silver bullet (even though its a mild gerrymander at best, the Dems could easily make a clean 8-0 map but chose not to due to incumbent demands), but if you look across the country, most Democratic politicians and voters want CA-style commissions. Hell, the VA Dems just largely gave up their power to control redistricting.

Maryland and it's ridiculous looking districts regularly makes the list of most gerrymandered states, even though the entire Eastern shore and Western Maryland are heavily Republican. If that's not gerrymandering, the Democrats will have to stop complaining about it altogether because it's certainly worse than anything the Republicans have done. As for Virginia, most Democrats actually opposed the amendment, which was supported mostly by Republicans. But it's telling again how, even in a hard won Democratic controlled House of Delegates, Republicans vote for their party interests while Democrats break ranks.

1. The argument of "The Republicans do it all the time, so why shouldnt we?" is not going to win at the ballots box.

2. The amount of money and political power that'd have to be used in a state like CA is enormous, and thats not even considering the fact that such an idea would be very unpopular. You could use the same amount of money to fund non-partisan redistricting commissions in 10 states and get a ton more seats, while also not betraying their principles.

3. I think you have a fundamental misconception on the situation in both Maryland and Virginia.

Starting with Maryland, the seats dont have those ugly contortions due to the worry that an R might unseat a Dem, but from the worry that a D may primary out a D. Its an incumbent protection gerrymander designed to give the representatives a base so they arent kicked out of office. For instance, Steny Hoyer's seat in a fair map would not change politically, but demographically, he'd now be sitting in an African American plurality seat which would endanger him. Ruppersberger always wants to have Maryland military bases in his seat, which is why its given such an odd contortion, etc. If the Ds truly wanted a partisan gerrymander, they would've just taken the whole congressional delegation with a bunch of straight lines and simple pairings.

As for VA, the reason for why many Dems opposed the commission wasnt because of some want or need to gerrymander, but because the commission would throw the map to the heavily R Supreme Court. Many of the VADEMs wanted to propose an alternative plan that looked more like CA, but didnt have the votes.

[Nyvin]

Maryland and it's ridiculous looking districts regularly makes the list of most gerrymandered states, even though the entire Eastern shore and Western Maryland are heavily Republican. If that's not gerrymandering, the Democrats will have to stop complaining about it altogether because it's certainly worse than anything the Republicans have done. As for Virginia, most Democrats actually opposed the amendment, which was supported mostly by Republicans. But it's telling again how, even in a hard won Democratic controlled House of Delegates, Republicans vote for their party interests while Democrats break ranks.

Even with a fair map in Maryland, the Republicans would only gain 1 seat (the western one).  I would hardly call 7D-1R an extreme partisan gerrymander.

Like others have said, the contortions in the map are for the benefits of the incumbents, not for the Democratic Party.

(No a "fair" map wouldn't give Republicans 3-4 seats either before someone brings that up, that'd be an R gerrymander)

[Beet]

1. The argument of "The Republicans do it all the time, so why shouldnt we?" is not going to win at the ballots box.

That's not the argument. The argument is that Congress should be a representative body that reflects the will of the voters in elections terms of partisan distribution without distortion, and it is distorted when one side and one side only gerrymanders. That is not a novel argument; it's the same one Democrats used to argue before the (Republican controlled) Supreme Court to strike down Wisconsin's district lines. And since all four bodies of government are already distorted (the House and Senate due to state size differences, the Presidency and Supreme Court due to the Electoral Collegevand Senate) the least that government can do for voters is not add to that distortion by acquiescing to further one-sided Republican gerrymandering. It's a question of democratic principle versus unilateral surrender.

And it wouldn't have to be at the ballot box. The Democrats just need to get a majority on the redistricting commission who will agree to offsetting Republican gerrymanders.

2. The amount of money and political power that'd have to be used in a state like CA is enormous, and thats not even considering the fact that such an idea would be very unpopular. You could use the same amount of money to fund non-partisan redistricting commissions in 10 states and get a ton more seats, while also not betraying their principles.

Then where are those ten non-partisan redistricting commissions? I would easily agree to your idea except it hasn't happened.

3. I think you have a fundamental misconception on the situation in both Maryland and Virginia.

Starting with Maryland, the seats dont have those ugly contortions due to the worry that an R might unseat a Dem, but from the worry that a D may primary out a D. Its an incumbent protection gerrymander designed to give the representatives a base so they arent kicked out of office. For instance, Steny Hoyer's seat in a fair map would not change politically, but demographically, he'd now be sitting in an African American plurality seat which would endanger him. Ruppersberger always wants to have Maryland military bases in his seat, which is why its given such an odd contortion, etc. If the Ds truly wanted a partisan gerrymander, they would've just taken the whole congressional delegation with a bunch of straight lines and simple pairings.

This is simply off topic. Maryland is not only one of only two states with more than three congressional seats where every single district is ranked "unusually Democratic" by FivethirtyEight, it is one of the highest ranking states in the country by the Brennan Center's "efficiency gap" measure when adjusted for size. That it has a partisan gerrymander is not in dispute. The fact that Steny Hoyer didn't choose to draw himself out of a seat is neither exclusive to this nor the least surprising or interesting.

As for VA, the reason for why many Dems opposed the commission wasnt because of some want or need to gerrymander, but because the commission would throw the map to the heavily R Supreme Court. Many of the VADEMs wanted to propose an alternative plan that looked more like CA, but didnt have the votes.

This is sophistry. The Democrats were heavily committed to campaigning in the commission and the legislature voted in a 85-13 bipartisan vote for it when Democrats were in the minority but expected to pick up the chamber. Then when the Democrats took a majority, 45 of them suddenly decided they were against it, even though they faced massive pressure to make good in a campaign pledge. Only the legislative black caucus voted against it and had consistently opposed it.

[Beet]

Maryland and it's ridiculous looking districts regularly makes the list of most gerrymandered states, even though the entire Eastern shore and Western Maryland are heavily Republican. If that's not gerrymandering, the Democrats will have to stop complaining about it altogether because it's certainly worse than anything the Republicans have done. As for Virginia, most Democrats actually opposed the amendment, which was supported mostly by Republicans. But it's telling again how, even in a hard won Democratic controlled House of Delegates, Republicans vote for their party interests while Democrats break ranks.

Even with a fair map in Maryland, the Republicans would only gain 1 seat (the western one).  I would hardly call 7D-1R an extreme partisan gerrymander.

Like others have said, the contortions in the map are for the benefits of the incumbents, not for the Democratic Party.

(No a "fair" map wouldn't give Republicans 3-4 seats either before someone brings that up, that'd be an R gerrymander)

I mean to state the obvious, that's because Maryland is a very small state. A 1 seat difference is a massive distortion percentage wise. With small states you have to get small numbers by definition. Are people here seriously arguing that Maryland is not gerrymandered? Even the Brennan Center admits that Maryland is gerrymandered.
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/marylands-extreme-gerrymander

Hell, even Martin O'Malley admits it:
https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/531492/

[lfromnj]

Maryland and it's ridiculous looking districts regularly makes the list of most gerrymandered states, even though the entire Eastern shore and Western Maryland are heavily Republican. If that's not gerrymandering, the Democrats will have to stop complaining about it altogether because it's certainly worse than anything the Republicans have done. As for Virginia, most Democrats actually opposed the amendment, which was supported mostly by Republicans. But it's telling again how, even in a hard won Democratic controlled House of Delegates, Republicans vote for their party interests while Democrats break ranks.

Even with a fair map in Maryland, the Republicans would only gain 1 seat (the western one).  I would hardly call 7D-1R an extreme partisan gerrymander.

Like others have said, the contortions in the map are for the benefits of the incumbents, not for the Democratic Party.

(No a "fair" map wouldn't give Republicans 3-4 seats either before someone brings that up, that'd be an R gerrymander)

A fair map could give Republicans a chance at 3 seats in MD depending on how you do it, for example a Western shore based district with Anne Arrundel and south. That is not an R gerrymander, its just another variation of a fair map. The third district is obviously a tossup any further would be a gerrymander.

[Roll Roons]

Maryland and it's ridiculous looking districts regularly makes the list of most gerrymandered states, even though the entire Eastern shore and Western Maryland are heavily Republican. If that's not gerrymandering, the Democrats will have to stop complaining about it altogether because it's certainly worse than anything the Republicans have done. As for Virginia, most Democrats actually opposed the amendment, which was supported mostly by Republicans. But it's telling again how, even in a hard won Democratic controlled House of Delegates, Republicans vote for their party interests while Democrats break ranks.

Even with a fair map in Maryland, the Republicans would only gain 1 seat (the western one).  I would hardly call 7D-1R an extreme partisan gerrymander.

Like others have said, the contortions in the map are for the benefits of the incumbents, not for the Democratic Party.

(No a "fair" map wouldn't give Republicans 3-4 seats either before someone brings that up, that'd be an R gerrymander)

A fair map could give Republicans a chance at 3 seats in MD depending on how you do it, for example a Western shore based district with Anne Arrundel and south.

Even Bob Ehrlich's old district (all of Harford, most of Baltimore County and a bit of Anne Arundel) would have still been pretty R-leaning. Connie would have also held on under the old maps, but her district would have almost certainly gone in 2006.

[SevenEleven]

California Democrats have opted to do it through ballot harvesting. A Republican leads on election night? Oh, we magically found thousands of extra ballots that broke 90% of the Democrat.

And before people accuse me of being a partisan hack, note who I'm endorsing for president.

Give me an effing break.

Perhaps you aren't a partisan hack and instead you are simply ill-informed. Ballot harvesting is not a tool for California Democrats, it is equally available to California Republicans and NPPs. California's late Dem swings have preceded the legalization of said "ballot harvesting". This is largely considered to be a function of vote by mail/absentee ballots that only have to be postmarked by election day, meaning it could take a couple days to even arrive before being counted. What sort of voter is likely to vote by mail? Working families, union members, young people, urban voters who don't have time to wait in long lines, and people with inadequate access to personal transportation. Considering these factors, it's pretty obvious why these later-arriving ballots are more heavily Democratic.

[SevenEleven]

The people voted for it. Also I highly doubt that you could get a 52-0 map. Prior to the commission Democrats had gerrymandered the state and couldn't get anything even close to that.

The gerrymander in the 2000s was bipartisan incumbent protection...

I'll add that it protected incumbents of a map that was essentially a court-drawn Republican gerrymander.

[TrendsareUsuallyReal]

The people voted for it. Also I highly doubt that you could get a 52-0 map. Prior to the commission Democrats had gerrymandered the state and couldn't get anything even close to that.

I can easily draw you a 52-0 map if you’d like

[lfromnj]

The people voted for it. Also I highly doubt that you could get a 52-0 map. Prior to the commission Democrats had gerrymandered the state and couldn't get anything even close to that.

I can easily draw you a 52-0 map if you’d like

I mean its relatively easy but you got a lot of minority district members and other incumbents who would be pissed, my guess is it would end up somewhere like 50-2 or 49-3(cut the NOCAL seats first as no VRA seats are in the north and its easy to baconmander into the bay area)

[Zaybay]

That's not the argument. The argument is that Congress should be a representative body that reflects the will of the voters in elections terms of partisan distribution without distortion, and it is distorted when one side and one side only gerrymanders. That is not a novel argument; it's the same one Democrats used to argue before the (Republican controlled) Supreme Court to strike down Wisconsin's district lines. And since all four bodies of government are already distorted (the House and Senate due to state size differences, the Presidency and Supreme Court due to the Electoral Collegevand Senate) the least that government can do for voters is not add to that distortion by acquiescing to further one-sided Republican gerrymandering. It's a question of democratic principle versus unilateral surrender.

And it wouldn't have to be at the ballot box. The Democrats just need to get a majority on the redistricting commission who will agree to offsetting Republican gerrymanders.

I'd really like to see you convince Democratic, Independent, and Republican voters of this argument. Sure, it may work for someone who's highly politically invested, but for the electorate, its a horrible argument that can be easily boiled down by its opponents as "The Rs can do it in other states, so we should do it to". For the Ds, its completely hypocritical and antithetical to their values. For the Rs, its an argument literally saying "The Rs have too much power. Lets lock them out, forever."

Then where are those ten non-partisan redistricting commissions? I would easily agree to your idea except it hasn't happened.

I was giving a hypothetical. The amount of money it would cost to push a ballot question in CA is astronomical. To give an example, it costs on average $2 million just to collect the signatures to get on the ballot in CA. Meanwhile, in a state like AR, this phase can cost only $100K. The Utah Dems were able to push for a commission-like body with less than $3 million total.

And, just for the record, there have been a number of commissions set up across the US in just the past 4 years (CO, MI, UT, OH, MO, maybe AR, OK, NV, NE, OR this year if they get on the ballot) and while not all of them are fully independent, and while some only do state legislature seats and others just congressional seats, they're a huge step in the direction towards fair redistricting.

This is simply off topic. Maryland is not only one of only two states with more than three congressional seats where every single district is ranked "unusually Democratic" by FivethirtyEight, it is one of the highest ranking states in the country by the Brennan Center's "efficiency gap" measure when adjusted for size. That it has a partisan gerrymander is not in dispute. The fact that Steny Hoyer didn't choose to draw himself out of a seat is neither exclusive to this nor the least surprising or interesting.

I will agree that MD's map does feature more very safe Democratic seats than a fairer map. But my point wasnt whether it was a gerrymander or not, but instead why the seats are so contorted and oddly shaped. As I've stated before, its very easy to draw an 8-0 D map of Maryland without resorting to contorted lines like the current map. Its drawn like that not for partisan advantage, but simply because each incumbent had different wants and demands that forced the lines to be contorted in an odd fashion. If MD is the worse case of gerrymandering by Democrats, then its really not that bad compared to its southern cousin, NC, which before a court intervened had only 3 D seats and 10 R seats.

This is sophistry. The Democrats were heavily committed to campaigning in the commission and the legislature voted in a 85-13 bipartisan vote for it when Democrats were in the minority but expected to pick up the chamber. Then when the Democrats took a majority, 45 of them suddenly decided they were against it, even though they faced massive pressure to make good in a campaign pledge. Only the legislative black caucus voted against it and had consistently opposed it.

Reading through the vote that took place, it was stated by multiple D legislators that they wanted to get rid of the SC part, but thought that they could remove it once the real bill was being finalized. It was not, and so the same Ds who had hesitations on that part voted against it. Meanwhile, the Rs voted heavily in favor of the redistricting bill because of this stipulation. Its not very difficult to see how this all connects.

Anyway, a lot of this is getting away from the fact that, even if you were correct on every point, the CADEMs are not the MDDEMs or the VADEMs or the OHDEMs. They're the CADEMs, and there has been no want nor need to even push against the commission. There's no point in getting rid of it, there's too much of a cost in even attempting, and both the voters and the legislators like it. The country is moving in the direction of California, not the other way around. They're never getting rid of their commission.

[Non Swing Voter]

because Democrats unilaterally hold themselves to a higher standard due to their principles, while allowing the GOP to steal elections and destroy the country.  Because principles are more important than actual real world consequences.

[Beet]

I'd really like to see you convince Democratic, Independent, and Republican voters of this argument. Sure, it may work for someone who's highly politically invested, but for the electorate, its a horrible argument that can be easily boiled down by its opponents as "The Rs can do it in other states, so we should do it to". For the Ds, its completely hypocritical and antithetical to their values. For the Rs, its an argument literally saying "The Rs have too much power. Lets lock them out, forever."

But they haven't even tried. It'd be one thing if they tried, and failed, even once. But they haven't tried.

Further, that you characterize the argument as against the Ds values show that you're still mischaraterizing it. All they need argue is that Congress should represent the partisan makeup of the nationwide vote with no handicaps. If the Ds won't even make a principled argument in favor of democracy to a heavily favorable electorate like California's, out of pre-emptive defeatism, no wonder they constantly get rolled by a party willing to make bad faith arguments to maximize power at any cost.

I was giving a hypothetical. The amount of money it would cost to push a ballot question in CA is astronomical. To give an example, it costs on average $2 million just to collect the signatures to get on the ballot in CA. Meanwhile, in a state like AR, this phase can cost only $100K. The Utah Dems were able to push for a commission-like body with less than $3 million total.

And, just for the record, there have been a number of commissions set up across the US in just the past 4 years (CO, MI, UT, OH, MO, maybe AR, OK, NV, NE, OR this year if they get on the ballot) and while not all of them are fully independent, and while some only do state legislature seats and others just congressional seats, they're a huge step in the direction towards fair redistricting.

$2 million is nothing. In 2016, the average cost of a House seat was $1.5 million per cycle, and that is only going up with time. And if the commissions you've named, the OH commission still leaves ultimate control in the hands of Republican officials, the CO commission is just more unilateral Democratic project, the Utah commission is subject to the whims of the state legislature and the group that pushed for it already has said the legislature wants to gut it, and the MO and MI commissions are under all out assault from a combination of double jeopardy, defunding, and court challenge. Not a single one in a red state is s secure success.

I will agree that MD's map does feature more very safe Democratic seats than a fairer map. But my point wasnt whether it was a gerrymander or not, but instead why the seats are so contorted and oddly shaped. As I've stated before, its very easy to draw an 8-0 D map of Maryland without resorting to contorted lines like the current map. Its drawn like that not for partisan advantage, but simply because each incumbent had different wants and demands that forced the lines to be contorted in an odd fashion. If MD is the worse case of gerrymandering by Democrats, then its really not that bad compared to its southern cousin, NC, which before a court intervened had only 3 D seats and 10 R seats.

You can argue until you're blue in the face, but you're the only one who says it's not a gerrymander
- The Brennan Center says it's a gerrymander
- FiveThirtyEight says it's s gerrymander
- Vox says it's a gerrymander
- The Supreme Court says it's a gerrymander although it won't intervene
- O'Malley says it's a gerrymander

It's generally agreed to be a gerrymander. You're in the minority with your wrong opinion.

Reading through the vote that took place, it was stated by multiple D legislators that they wanted to get rid of the SC part, but thought that they could remove it once the real bill was being finalized. It was not, and so the same Ds who had hesitations on that part voted against it. Meanwhile, the Rs voted heavily in favor of the redistricting bill because of this stipulation. Its not very difficult to see how this all connects.

The SC part can be addressed by subsequent legislation if needed. The Ds voted for it in 2019 and gave no indication they didn't support it as written. Even the Washington Post, hardly a right wing rag, argued that voting for it again would be keeping a promise. So the 33 defectors were either hypocritical or dishonest. Either way it's a bad look.

Anyway, a lot of this is getting away from the fact that, even if you were correct on every point, the CADEMs are not the MDDEMs or the VADEMs or the OHDEMs. They're the CADEMs, and there has been no want nor need to even push against the commission. There's no point in getting rid of it, there's too much of a cost in even attempting, and both the voters and the legislators like it. The country is moving in the direction of California, not the other way around. They're never getting rid of their commission.

If that's the case, why the vociferous defense? You sound less like a confident person and more like someone with a brittle and vulnerable position.

If you're right that there is a wave of commissions sweeping the country then we have no disagreement...Then I support the California commission 100%.

But the sad reality is the opposite.

Since the last redistricting cycle, the Supreme Court struck down the Voting Rights Act. That means for the first time since 1965, Republican map drawers no longer have to worry about racial discrimination and will freely disenfranchise millions of Black voters.

Worse, the Supreme Court also for the first time in history has explicitly ruled partisan gerrymandering constitutional. This for the first time Republican map drawers will no longer have to worry about federal court oversight no matter how wild their maps or what their intent.

Partisan gerrymandering is about to be bigger than it ever was.

Worse, the majority that ruled Arizona's independent commission constitutional in 2015 included the four liberals and Anthony Kennedy only. With Kennedy replaced by Kavanaugh, the majority that thinks independent commissions are even constitutional probably no longer exists. The Supreme Court could at anytime by the stroke of a pen wipe away every independent commission in the country. And even if they don't, they can overturn any state's commission based on idiosyncratic factors.

If anything, advocates of independent commissions should welcome arguments that states like California should move to partisan gerrymandering, as the threat alone would change the right wing justices' calculus.

[doc gerritcole]

The short answer is Dems lack a killer instinct  - 7 more seats is massive considering that makes up for GOP gerrymandering in NC/OH/TX or just in general less favorable maps elsewhere

[pppolitics]

...because it would be hypocritical to get rid of the independent redistricting commission in favor of partisan redistricting/gerrymandering while complaining about gerrymandering in Republican-controlled states.