Ten things I hate about U[.S. redistricting]
Probably not a great sequel to the 1999 rom-com
In the 2024 Congressional election, gerrymandering plays a more limited role than it did ten years ago. With more independent commissions and state-level court actions, some of the worst excesses have been trimmed down. As a result, the net advantage to either party at the national level is reduced.
In 2013, I estimated that the total effect of partisan gerrymandering was so extreme that Democrats could win the national vote by 7 points and still not end up controlling the House of Representatives. That’s no longer true. Roughly speaking, this November whichever party wins more votes will likely gain control of the House. The risk of minoritarian rule is still there, but it’s reduced considerably.
An injustice against one is still an injustice against all
However, that doesn't change the fact that in specific states around the country, competition is still stifled because of how the lines are drawn. Even though Congressional gerrymanders committed by Democrats and Republicans cancel each other out somewhat this year, those offenses still remove competition wherever they occur. And in the case of legislative gerrymandering, voters are disenfranchised from decisions that affect them directly.
The Princeton Gerrymandering Project has catalogued such offenses using its report card system. Today I will show you ten of the worst remaining Congressional gerrymanders.
It’s not just about shapes
People think of gerrymanders as consisting of funny-shaped individual districts. But that’s not true. A clever expert with mapping software can lasso voters wherever they live, and those districts sometimes even look superficially OK. Also, these days gerrymandering is not a single-district offense. Instead, the offense arises from skew in the statewide plan as a whole.
Cracking cities
A fundamental tool of gerrymandering is cracking, the practice of splitting a community to take away its influence. This year, multiple cities have fallen victim to this particular strategy.
Tennessee’s Fifth (and Sixth and Seventh) Congressional District. Nashville has been traditionally contained with a single congressional district. But Tennessee legislators split the old TN-05 three ways, removing the ability of this city of nearly 700,000 people to send someone to Congress.
Nashville/Davidson was split into the Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh Congressional Districts. Utah’s Fourth Congressional District. Greater Salt Lake City is an island of blue in a sea of red. Traditionally, it has been enclosed within a single district, which has led Democrats to have one of Utah’s Congressional seats. But this time, legislators trampled a newly-established citizen commission to spread Salt Lake City across all four districts of the state. A recent state Supreme Court ruling could return power to the commission, and Salt Lake City could gain representation once again.
Nevada’s First Congressional District. Cracking can also be used to split ethnic communities. Nevada Democrats used highways as artificial boundaries to distribute Hispanic voters between two districts, giving them partisan influence but removing their ability to vote as a unified group.
The northern boundary of Nevada’s First Congressional District goes right through heavily Hispanic areas of greater Las Vegas.
Funny shapes and rural snakes
Sometimes gerrymanders take the more familiar form of convoluted shapes.
Ohio’s Fifteenth Congressional District. A politician-based commission drew a map that could make as many as 13 out of 15 Ohio House seats Republican. But if voters pass a constitutional amendment in November to take away their power, an independent citizen commission could redraw Ohio's Fifteenth - and every other district in the state.
Ohio’s 15th Congressional District, tiptoeing right up to Columbus in the east and dodging Springfield in the south, to create a safe Republican district. 5/6/7/8. Texas Seventh, Ninth, Eighteenth, and Twenty-Ninth Congressional Districts. It is impossible to pick one favorite district here. Houston has expanded in several directions, with burgeoning Asian and Hispanic populations. The partisan redistricting commission has managed to pack heavily Democratic communities into these four districts, thus allowing the nearby Second and Thirty-Eighth Districts to be safely Republican.
9. North Carolina’s Sixth Congressional District. In 2022, a state Supreme Court struck down a partisan gerrymander, putting in place a much fairer map. But the election of several Republicans to the court that fall led that court to reverse itself. At that point the legislature promptly passed a new plan that is likely to elect at least 10 Republicans out of 14 seats in this 50-50 state. Here, the Sixth District is nestled between Winston-Salem, Greensboro, and Charlotte to create a safe Republican district.
10. Illinois’ Thirteenth Congressional District. Rounding out our list is this specimen, which manages to go all the way from East St. Louis to Urbana-Champaign, combining an urban community, a college town, and a few strays along the way to create a safe Democratic district.
Hope for the Future
Some of these offenses could get undone, as early as next year. If Ohio voters pass Issue One, a citizen commission will redraw the map there and undo the statewide partisan gerrymander. And if Utah’s citizen commission is allowed to get on with its work without interference from the legislature, they can undo that offense as well.
To learn more about Ohio reform, see the Electoral Innovation Lab’s 2023 report.
Finally, in future years, gerrymandering in Nevada and Illinois could be outlawed directly by citizens. In those states, ballot initiatives can amend the constitution to take the redistricting power away from legislators.
To learn more about how voters can make democracy work better across the nation, see Vote Maximizer. Also, support Vote Maximizer!
