2020 Census and Redistricting: Kentucky

[Gass3268]

Top Kentucky Republicans in Washington, including Mitch McConnell, want the Louisville district to remain. The NC and PA situations from the last cycle have scared many of them into wanting to play it safe and prevent lawsuits.

https://twitter.com/sarahnferris/status/1412383562863611918?s=20

[ProgressiveModerate]

Wonder why McConnel of all people wants the Louisville based district to remain? He's usually the one who's all in for GOP power grabs.

[TML]

Wonder why McConnel of all people wants the Louisville based district to remain? He's usually the one who's all in for GOP power grabs.

Probably because in this case he suspects that manipulating that district in Republicans' favor would probably not survive court challenges against it.

[Del Tachi]

Wonder why McConnel of all people wants the Louisville based district to remain? He's usually the one who's all in for GOP power grabs.

Maybe your view of McConnell is a bit too one-demensional?  lol

[Nyvin]

Top Kentucky Republicans in Washington, including Mitch McConnell, want the Louisville district to remain. The NC and PA situations from the last cycle have scared many of them into wanting to play it safe and prevent lawsuits.

https://twitter.com/sarahnferris/status/1412383562863611918?s=20

Are they nervous heavy gerrymanders around the country would lead to national indy commissions like what's in the HR1 bill or something?

[Skill and Chance]

Top Kentucky Republicans in Washington, including Mitch McConnell, want the Louisville district to remain. The NC and PA situations from the last cycle have scared many of them into wanting to play it safe and prevent lawsuits.

https://twitter.com/sarahnferris/status/1412383562863611918?s=20

Are they nervous heavy gerrymanders around the country would lead to national indy commissions like what's in the HR1 bill or something?

Kentucky has judicial elections for the state supreme court.  There is no hardline conservative majority.
 In fact, a moderate was elected over a conservative hardliner last year.  The KY supreme court has a history of intervening in redistricting, including a decision to throw out the 2011 state legislative maps.
 This is likely what explains the GOP's inclination to leave Yarmuth alone, while they are inclined to go for Cooper's seat in neighboring TN where the legislature chooses the judges. 

For reference, this is what the landscape looks like nationwide.  The green states have true judicial elections, where it is possible to directly elect someone who strongly disagrees with the current governor and state legislature to the highest court in the state.  The dark green shade means partisan elections and the light green shade means non-partisan elections.  Note TX, GA, and IL, which could potentially be the PA and NC of the late 2020's.

[_.]

I tried my hand at a fair congressional map of Kentucky using the 2020 census results.

Although it is one of the first states that will be publishing maps, its redistricting megathread has been relatively inactive, especially now as it looks like representative John Yarmuth of Louisville will not be getting drawn out.

This is despite him being easier to draw out than Jim Cooper of Nashville, Tennessee, or Emmanuel Cleaver of Kansas City, Missouri. Yarmuth has the special protection of Mitch McConnell.

Image Link

The Population Deviation is 0.01%, and it reflects the 2020 Census.

94/100 on Dave's Proportionality Index
59/100 on the Compactness Index
94/100 on County Splitting
0/100 on the Minority Representation index (you see, Kentucky doesn't have minorities)
3/100 on Dave's competitiveness index (that's Kentucky for you)

The map above shows results from the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election (the closest to the 2020 U.S. Presidential election out of the choices given).

Check it out here and see county and municipality boundaries.


Partisan Breakdown by Election

2016 U.S. Senate Election in Kentucky: 4R to 2D

2016 U.S. Presidential Election in Kentucky: 5R to 1D

2019 Kentucky Attorney General Election: 5R to 1D

2019 Kentucky Gubernatorial Election: 4R to 2D


This map has one seat based around Louisville which is 22% Black by VAP.
That district went to Clinton by a margin of 15.4%.

The map also has another seat in Kentucky's East-Central region which contains the city of Lexington. This seat voted for Beshear and Rand Paul's challenger in 2016, but also voted for Trump.

All the other seats are as deep Republican as can be. Of particular interest is the seat KY-6, in Kentucky's far East. It is 94.6% White, and voted for Trump with 77% of the vote (and a margin of nearly 60%!). It would no doubt be one of the most Republican districts in the country if it came to fruition.

The hypothetical KY-6 is also undergoing fast decline, being disproportionately elderly, poor, and economically hurting. Its population dropped from 782K to 751K over the last ten years (a decrease of 4%!), and certain counties deep in coal country that have hurted the most, such as Pike, Martin, Harlan, Letcher, and Knott, have seen declines up to 13%!


Opinions?

[Meatball Ron]

I tried my hand at a fair congressional map of Kentucky using the 2020 census results.

Snip

Do you know what the 2020 presidential results were in KY-05 on here (most similar to the current KY-06)? Trying to figure out how similar it is to the current KY-06 (Trump +9, Beshear +13, not sure if it voted for Paul in '16).

[Nyvin]

One county split KY map -

https://davesredistricting.org/join/6c057d3a-a51c-4a37-9fc8-a4c805cca639

[Mr.Phips]

https://twitter.com/joesonka/status/1448442566089773061?s=20

Surprising amount of interest in a safe Democratic seat from Republicans. Is this a tell they might actually weaken KY-03?

The only way it would be winnable for Republicans would be to crack Jefferson county.

[TML]

https://twitter.com/joesonka/status/1448442566089773061?s=20

Surprising amount of interest in a safe Democratic seat from Republicans. Is this a tell they might actually weaken KY-03?

The only way it would be winnable for Republicans would be to crack Jefferson county.

And such a move would probably not withstand court challenges against it, based on a set of criteria adopted by KY's redistricting committee back in 1991:

https://www.ncsl.org/Portals/1/Documents/Redistricting/KY_Guidelines_1991_20076.pdf

[Thunder98]

According to the Speaker, the GOP expects to finish their redistricting plans soon.

https://www.wsiltv.com/news/kentucky/speaker-lawmakers-hope-to-wrap-up-redistricting-plan-soon/article_c5d3ce62-b161-59f8-89bc-e3a6d6e40068.html

[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Top Kentucky Republicans in Washington, including Mitch McConnell, want the Louisville district to remain. The NC and PA situations from the last cycle have scared many of them into wanting to play it safe and prevent lawsuits.

https://twitter.com/sarahnferris/status/1412383562863611918?s=20

Are they nervous heavy gerrymanders around the country would lead to national indy commissions like what's in the HR1 bill or something?

Kentucky has judicial elections for the state supreme court.  There is no hardline conservative majority.
 In fact, a moderate was elected over a conservative hardliner last year.  The KY supreme court has a history of intervening in redistricting, including a decision to throw out the 2011 state legislative maps.
 This is likely what explains the GOP's inclination to leave Yarmuth alone, while they are inclined to go for Cooper's seat in neighboring TN where the legislature chooses the judges. 

For reference, this is what the landscape looks like nationwide.  The green states have true judicial elections, where it is possible to directly elect someone who strongly disagrees with the current governor and state legislature to the highest court in the state.  The dark green shade means partisan elections and the light green shade means non-partisan elections.  Note TX, GA, and IL, which could potentially be the PA and NC of the late 2020's.

To clarify despite this it's virtually impossible to defeat an incumbent Minnesota Supreme Court Justice and this hasn't happened since the 30s. Although there will likely be an open seat election in 2024 that I expect will play out like a partisan election on both sides due to a conservative justice hitting mandatory retirement age right before the election.

[Brittain33]

According to the Speaker, the GOP expects to finish their redistricting plans soon.

https://www.wsiltv.com/news/kentucky/speaker-lawmakers-hope-to-wrap-up-redistricting-plan-soon/article_c5d3ce62-b161-59f8-89bc-e3a6d6e40068.html

Fast enough to make this the worst week ever for laser-eyes ET, I wonder, by not slicing up KY-3?

[lfromnj]

I doubt they do it , but to note all those rules are merely laws and not part of the state constitution. They could be repealed along with a redistricting bill.

[Frodo]

According to the Speaker, the GOP expects to finish their redistricting plans soon.

https://www.wsiltv.com/news/kentucky/speaker-lawmakers-hope-to-wrap-up-redistricting-plan-soon/article_c5d3ce62-b161-59f8-89bc-e3a6d6e40068.html

Which means that to speed the process along, they have to do so behind closed doors with virtually no transparency so lawmakers can (understandably) go home and enjoy the holidays with their families:

Republicans drawing Kentucky legislative maps behind closed doors ahead of redistricting session

[Skill and Chance]

According to the Speaker, the GOP expects to finish their redistricting plans soon.

https://www.wsiltv.com/news/kentucky/speaker-lawmakers-hope-to-wrap-up-redistricting-plan-soon/article_c5d3ce62-b161-59f8-89bc-e3a6d6e40068.html

Which means that to speed the process along, they have to do so behind closed doors with virtually no transparency so lawmakers can (understandably) go home and enjoy the holidays with their families:

Republicans drawing Kentucky legislative maps behind closed doors ahead of redistricting session

Suggests they probably are going to take a swing at KY-03. 

[Greedo punched first]

KY-03 gets converted to safe R?

[lfromnj]

According to the Speaker, the GOP expects to finish their redistricting plans soon.

https://www.wsiltv.com/news/kentucky/speaker-lawmakers-hope-to-wrap-up-redistricting-plan-soon/article_c5d3ce62-b161-59f8-89bc-e3a6d6e40068.html

Which means that to speed the process along, they have to do so behind closed doors with virtually no transparency so lawmakers can (understandably) go home and enjoy the holidays with their families:

Republicans drawing Kentucky legislative maps behind closed doors ahead of redistricting session

Suggests they probably are going to take a swing at KY-03.  

This is legislative maps, probably just breaking up rural democrats state house seats to mix up their territory. Maybe take a seat or 2 in southern Jeffco along with take back the gerrymandered Covington seat.

Actually the current South louisville seats are a pretty blatant Democratic baconmander so they probably just clean it up there. The actual issue will be protecting the Eastern Louisville GOP districts.

[Skill and Chance]

Redistricting still won't make this congressional district competitive for GOP | Opinion

The old “Best of Luck to You” vapors are back. According to Republican state lawmakers I have spoken with, when their 2022 redistricting bill is released, it will feature no move, as in none, to make our 3rd Congressional District here in Louisville competitive in next year’s election – or in the next five elections. To use former Sen. Williams’ parlance, a deal has apparently been cut to make the districts of Kentucky’s five incumbent GOP U.S. House members in the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th and 6th Districts even more impregnable. To accomplish this goal, it is said, the current boundaries of the 3rd District will be left more or less intact.

Kentucky going 5-1 unless something very unusual happens

So KY is going to end up being the one multi-district small state that doesn't go off the deep end.

After the OH and NC courts inevitably order changes, most all of the large states will be +/-1 district for either party (pending IL and NY, and the former is already facing court scrutiny), while the small states are gerrymandered to kingdom come.

[Roll Roons]

Redistricting still won't make this congressional district competitive for GOP | Opinion

The old “Best of Luck to You” vapors are back. According to Republican state lawmakers I have spoken with, when their 2022 redistricting bill is released, it will feature no move, as in none, to make our 3rd Congressional District here in Louisville competitive in next year’s election – or in the next five elections. To use former Sen. Williams’ parlance, a deal has apparently been cut to make the districts of Kentucky’s five incumbent GOP U.S. House members in the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th and 6th Districts even more impregnable. To accomplish this goal, it is said, the current boundaries of the 3rd District will be left more or less intact.

Kentucky going 5-1 unless something very unusual happens

So KY is going to end up being the one multi-district small state that doesn't go off the deep end.

NE didn't really go off the deep end and I have a feeling KS won't do so either.

[Skill and Chance]

Redistricting still won't make this congressional district competitive for GOP | Opinion

The old “Best of Luck to You” vapors are back. According to Republican state lawmakers I have spoken with, when their 2022 redistricting bill is released, it will feature no move, as in none, to make our 3rd Congressional District here in Louisville competitive in next year’s election – or in the next five elections. To use former Sen. Williams’ parlance, a deal has apparently been cut to make the districts of Kentucky’s five incumbent GOP U.S. House members in the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th and 6th Districts even more impregnable. To accomplish this goal, it is said, the current boundaries of the 3rd District will be left more or less intact.

Kentucky going 5-1 unless something very unusual happens

So KY is going to end up being the one multi-district small state that doesn't go off the deep end.

NE didn't really go off the deep end and I have a feeling KS won't do so either.

NE wasn't true 1 party control for institutional reasons (state legislative filibuster). 

KS probably shouldn't be considered true 1 party control either.  The moderate GOP faction is greatly weakened and some of them have since become Dems, but Governor Kelly (D) only needs 3 GOP defectors out of 86 in the lower house to sustain a veto.

KY is a different world politically.  Republicans now have 3/4ths majorities in both chambers and it's a simple majority veto override state.  I do think, at least for later in the decade, they are wise not to gamble with the Lexington seat or the Cincinnatti suburbs.

[BoiseBoy]

https://twitter.com/wlkymark/status/1476319440312614912?s=21

[Oryxslayer]

https://twitter.com/wlkymark/status/1476319440312614912?s=21

We're expecting 5-1 based on the previous info, but any guesses on the contours of the others? Will they change significantly to ensure Lexington is DOA, or will they change minimally to because incumbents wanted their old seats? I'm thinking a mix, with the 6th going more southwards into the eternally Red rurals and the 1st dropping the arm's northern appendage for a consistent geographic core.

Legislatively I expect them to go Hog wild and for the only D seats to be in the cities - but this was inevitable and the map only sped up the process.

[Frodo]

The last remaining Democrats in eastern Kentucky will likely be going extinct in these new maps, I expect.  Especially in the House.