The big hit that flies beneath the radar - Redistricting.

[FBaggins]

It appears that republicans elected a record number of new state legislators (over 600 by my count)... winning as many as a dozen legislative bodies we previously held (here in NC it's both houses for the first time in over a century).

Redrawing Party Lines


These new state officials will help shape future congressional races as well. Congressional districts nationwide are due to be redrawn following this year’s census. In most states, that job falls to governors and legislators.

Setting district lines — and determining the populations that fall within them — can have a huge impact on the partisan makeup of House seats over the course of a decade.

A decade ago, Democrats enjoyed unilateral control over the process of drawing lines for 135 districts, compared with 98 for the GOP.

Following Tuesday's elections, Republicans will have a far more dramatic advantage. With some state results still coming in, the GOP will draw the lines for roughly 180 congressional districts. Democrats will draw just 30. The rest will be mapped under divided control, or by commissions.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=131029953

This means that we'll need to win 25-30 seats in 2012 to take back the House plus whatever pain they add in redistricting.

Here's hoping that the Voting Rights Division of the DoJ is ready to nix a few plans.

[pampango]

1. Indeed. Nonpartisan district boundaries (as exist in several states) are needed throughout the

country so that partisan gerrymandering passes into history.

[FBaggins]

4. Yes and no.

Keep in mind that "nonpartisan district boundaries" can have the same impact as republican-drawn boundaries.

[JCMach1]

2. Exactly, computer gerrymandering is insidious...

[DemocratSinceBirth]

3. Joe Trippi, Said With Redistricting, The House Is Probably Gone For A Decade

~

[FBaggins]

5. Take that with a grain of salt.

Heck... a whole shaker full of salt.

Take a look at the predictions from 2008 after our second-consecutive big victory. Republicans were going to be out of power for a generation.

I never bought into the spin around here in Aug/Sep that a month or two is a lifetime in politics and there was plenty of time to come back... but two years really IS a lifetime in politics.

[kick-ass-bob]

6. North Carolina lost both houses of the state legislature

Almost guaranteeing that the new split will be 8 or 9 to 5 Republican holds for the next 10 years. Mel Watt will probably be no more after 2012, and maybe Brad Miller too.

[FBaggins]

9. Yep, and the governor doesn't even have a role to play in redistricting.

Almost guaranteeing that the new split will be 8 or 9 to 5 Republican holds for the next 10 years.

It would be hard to make it that bad. I think that eight is the high end, and even that would risk a couple of the seats being vulnerable to a good democratic year. They already have to shore up their new 2nd district.

Mel Watt will probably be no more after 2012,

Nothing to worry about there. That district is already drawn perfectly for a republican gerrymander (most majority-minority districts are). If anything, they'll try to pile more democrats into that district.

[ProSense]

7. Isn't that what Tom Delay did?

How did that work out?

[FBaggins]

10. No. He re-redistricted in the middle of a cycle.

States are required to redistrict when the Census comes out.

How did that work out?

Pretty well I'd say. They picked up six seats. They now appear to have two more than even that.

[ProSense]

14. The Dems picked up seats in 2002, 2006 and 2008. n/t

[FBaggins]

15. Nope.. 2002 was before the redistricting in question...

...and 2006/2008 didn't get us back to the baseline (or even close) even though they were big Democratic years. In fact... we lost a seat in TX in 2008.

There's no spinning this. The actions got DeLay in some measure of trouble perhaps... but they had a positive legislative result for republicans. They went from owning 15 seats in Texas to holding 21... and they now hold 23 (assuming the TX 27th recount doesn't pull it out for us).

This was one of the reasons that we desperately wanted to knock off Rick Perry. TX is expected to pick up as many as four new House seats in redistricting. How many do you think will be drawn for a D?

[pstokely]

17. Those 4 seats could just shift Repuke house seats from other places to TX

Like Ohio or MI

[FBaggins]

18. Of course... but republicans could easily be drawing the lines there as well.

They appear to have an overwhelming redistricting advantage this cycle.

But the advantage of partisan redistricting isn't just that you might pick up a seat or two (Texas was a rare exception)... you also draw lines to protect existing incumbents (even if your state isn't losing or adding a seat). You take a House race that you lost 60-40 and two that you won by 3-5 points... and you turn it into a district that's 75-80% republican plus two D+9 districts.

[Jennicut]

8. I was looking at the House districts in all of the United States last night and

sometimes one has to wonder how these things were drawn up. Some are huge and some very small in the same state. Bizarre, really. At least CT seems to have a decent 5 district system. Sheesh.

[FBaggins]

11. It's more the irregular shapes that should set you off.

The size differences are to be expected. Each House member is supposed to represent (approx) the same number of constituents (unless they represent an entire state with less than that population).

The current number is about 700,000 per representative. So you can imagine that it takes more land area to encompass that many people in rural Illinois (where ~20 counties combine to make up the 15th district) than in Chicago (where something like seven democrats represent Cook County).

least CT seems to have a decent 5 district system.

I think if you look, you'll notice that the districts that contain New Haven, Bridgeport, and Hartford, cover less acreage than the CT 5th and 2nd. You'll probably also notice that we pack quite a few people into not very many square miles in CT. Two or three of those IL districts are larger than CT all by themselves.

[Jennicut]

12. True, I live in the 5th district but we have a lot less people in it, it is more rural.

The shapes some of these districts are in though...just wow.

[joe1991]

13. but they still need the votes

although a concern, I think cons are running out of the numbers nationwide.

Watching the races last night actually made me feel better. Countrywide most races were 50-something to 40-something. Hardly any real blowouts.

The country is purple and Dems are the one with the growing numbers.

[FBaggins]

16. "Hardly any real blowouts."

That's what partisan redistricting is designed to do. Draw a handful of blowout districts for your opponents and a bunch of 55-45 seats for yourself.

The country is purple and Dems are the one with the growing numbers.

I'll join the cheerleading ssquad in a few months. Right now we just got our butts handed to us.

[FBaggins]

19. Too late to edit - Add "holy #$!%... it isn't twelve legislative bodies..."

It's now eighteen with an additional five that are too close to call.

I think I'm going to be sick.

[FBaggins]

20. Up to 19 now. The CO House just fell.

At least we retained the CO Senate.