All I know about Utah is that its Mormon and overwhelmingly Republican. The largest city, Salt Lake, is Democratic but everything else is so Republican that the city does not have enough Democratic votes to overcome the rest of the state. I think that there is a growing Latino population in Utah and also a growing non-Mormon population. I also heard a while back that SLC had a surprisingly large gay population.
Utah should have actually got a 4th seat back in 2002 so a 4th seat is guaranteed for 2012. Right now there are three districts, two are ultra-conservative Republicans and one is a conservative Democrat (Jim Matheson). The Republicans will control everything in 2012.
There is no partisan information for redistricting on the app so all I could do was create as friendly of a district for Democrats as I could. I knew that Summit County, to the right of Salt Lake County, for whatever reason votes Democratic. The President won a third county, Grand County, which is in southeastern Utah. I guess that both Summit and Grand are skiing counties? Or perhaps they have Native American reservations. San Juan County, in the very southeastern corner, was 51-47 McCain. So what's up here?
Every other county was extremely Republican, often by more than 70%.
What I did was basically just make four districts – three that I knew would be very Republican and one that I made to be Democratic-friendly. (In my map, this is the blue district.) I have no idea if it would actually be good for the Democrats but it does put Summit County into this Salt Lake City-based district so I'm thinking this can only help. Of course, the Republicans know about Summit County and they'll most likely put it into a Republican district.
It looks like that Republicans will succeed in making four districts that went for McCain in 2008 and this will likely help them when the President is up for reelection in 2012. My prediction is a 3-1 Republican delegation in 2012, with a new Republican 4th district, but Jim Matheson may very well lose in 2012 if he is given a very different district.
It's a rather depressing map for Democrats, but it is one of the states that will gain a seat so I thought it was important to do.
2008 CNN Statewide County Results for Utah
(Links will open in new window.)
used 2000 census data, not 2009 estimates. Beyond that, this map isn’t bad if Republicans decide to pack Democrats instead of cracking them. Ideally they’d make the Democratic district liberal enough that Matheson could lose his primary.
Summit County is home to Park City, the popular and growing ski area, home to the Sundance Film Festival. As a result, it has attracted a significant population of artistic types, environmentalists, and other generally liberal types. It also probably has the lowest Mormon percentage in Utah, under 40%.
Utah sounds a lot like Wyoming. Why Wyoming is so Republican I don’t know either. There aren’t as many Mormons there. Is it because of gun control?
But I can’t see any reason why Utah Rethugs would settle for a 3R-1D map; they’ll go for 4R-0D.
let’s say New York
They make an agreement: Utah gives Matheson a safe Democratic SLC-based district. In return NY gives one of its Republicans (Michael Grimm?) a much safer district than they have now.
I can’t believe that Republicans would allow a Democrat seat in Utah. All the other districts are super safe, the only advantage of redistricting for them is to eliminate Matheson. When they primary Bennett and now are going for Hatch would they really leave Matheson alone?
posting the map–I tend agree with the 1/4 pizza slice of SLC plus the attempt to 4-0 GOP control.
There is an appeal for a single seat in Salt Lake City county. You can pile Matheson’s home area together with the most solid GOP area of the county. That would be a solid McCain seat that would be unlikely to elect any democrat but Matheson. Yet Matheson would probably still win. How many liberal votes has he cast in 2009-2010? Why bother too hard and you nail down three super safe republican seats.
I don’t think national parties have too much influence in redistricting. In WV & AR for one party plus Utah or Kansas in the other state interests prevail.
In Utah we will see whether the GOP wants to lock up 3-1 or be open to a 4-0 sweep. We will see maps in Maryland or IL on the democratic seat of this quandry plus the GOP will be the same situation in many states. What approach will each party in each state take?
Stay tuned.
The Governor and other Republican leaders were obviously not keen on that idea. Matheson is concerned about his seat, but even if they do put him in a tough district, he’s a survivor. He won in a very Republican seat in a terrible year for Democrats.
They put the man in an R+15 district, and he wins it handily. You could try to put him in n R+20 district, but he would probably win that too, and that might make another district less than 100% safe. I just don’t see them doing much more than they did.
If it contains both ultra-liberal (for Utah) and ultra-conservative areas, its Democratic primary electorate will be liberal while the district as a whole would be conservative.
Utah is so Republican that dummymanders just shouldn’t be that much of a concern. There’s also Matheson’s possible retirement to consider. The state GOP isn’t going to want some other Democrat to have a good shot at his open seat if that happens.
for Matheson if the GOP-held leg. is really going to concede him a seat. Salt Lake City actually has great precinct-drawing practices (…yes, I’m at a point where I can distinguish), where no precincts are split between Congressional districts, state leg seats (both House and Senate), municipalities, school board districts, etc. They also record any precinct changes in a very detailed table yearly. Therefore, with some quick pivot table magic, we get the following:
Utah’s also one of my favorite state to analyze, having written a sizable paper on population growth trends as a senior thesis in college; it’s also beautiful scenery…I would love it all the much more if not for the LDS Church’s bankrolling of Prop 8. Excerpt from my paper (a map of population growth with population in 1990 in light blue and population added between 1990 and 2000 in dark blue – most of the growth occurs in the intervening space between the major cities of SLC, Provo/Orem, and Ogden:
SLC itself is clearly the Democratic stronghold, but South Salt Lake should also get thrown into any Democrat-packing district. West Valley City is roughly split, but then we see a distinct pattern between southern SLCo between the suburbs east of I-15 and those west. The fast growing suburbs south of the city (especially the Jordans) are quite Republican, while the more established eastside burbs up against the Wasatches are a bit more friendly to Democrats; Murray and Midvale also have a higher Hispanic population (and therefore slightly less LDS-heavy), a fact reflected in the results as well.
Unincorporated SLCo is split evenly, but it encompasses a wide range of areas; my understanding is that Kearns (sandwiched between Taylorsville and not technically a municipality, but a “township”) is also relatively friendly to Democrats, and the voting behavior of the unincorporated eastside (Millcreek, East Millcreek) is what’s helped keep Matheson in office all these years.
Lastly, as many have cited, Summit County is the least LDS-heavy county in Utah, and Park City (great skiing!) attracts lots of types that would lean left.
Not a detail guy-always impressed when I see it.