I don’t see the point in trying to draw actual maps until we get the Census numbers next week (and when the precinct numbers are very different from projections, updated in Dave’s app), but that doesn’t stop me from drawing new districts. I’ve taken district counts I know won’t happen to draw districts that are hopefully different from the current ones in an interesting way.
The maps:
Indiana 7
Kentucky 8
Mississippi 3
Nebraska 4
Nevada 5
Oklahoma 7
Oregon 9 (two of these)
Indiana 7
In this map, we avoid putting any of Gary (CD1, blue, 72% white), South Bend (CD2, green), and Fort Wayne (CD3, purple, also picking up Muncie) in the same district, giving three relatively vertical districts. Considering how the population numbers didn’t really work for districts pairing these, I don’t see a Gary-South Bend district coming, especially as the Indiana GOP says they don’t want particularly ugly districts.
Marion County (CD4, red, 65% white) is just under the population for a CD, so it picks up a tiny bit of the northern suburbs. We then get districts for central Indiana (CD5, yellow, with West Lafayette, Anderson, and Indianapolis exurbs), southeast Indiana (CD6, teal), and southwest Indiana (CD7, gray, with Evansville, Terre Haute, and Louisville KY suburbs).
Kentucky 8
I’m not particularly familiar with the state, so this will be brief. We have 4 rural districts (blue, green, gray, and light purple) that are almost certainly safe R.
The teal district (Richmond, Elizabethtown) is probably also Republican. We then have a Cincinnati suburb district (purple), a Lexington to Louisville district (red), and a Louisville district (yellow, 69% white).
Mississippi 3
Pretty straightforward, the state would still have one VRA seat. CD1 [was 2] (blue, 56% black, 41% white) contains Jackson and the Mississippi River valley. CD2 [was 1] (green, 66% white, 30% black) contains northern Mississippi with Tupelo, Columbus, and Meridian; and CD3 [was 4] (70% white, 24% black) contains Hattiesburg and the gulf. This map might have been interesting before this year, as the 1 GOP congressman from MS was drawn out of a district.
Nebraska 4
Pretty straightforward, we still have basically concentric rings around Omaha. CD1 (blue, 72% white) shrinks to contain only part of Omaha, while CD2 contains the rest of the Omaha area and the city of Lincoln. CD3 contains the remaining part of the east out to Grand Island, and CD4 contains the rest.
Nevada 5
The largest visual change is that the Reno/Carson City area now has enough population for a district (CD5, yellow, 70% white) without rural Nevada, which is joined to the Las Vegas exurbs.
CD4 (red, 71% white) is almost certainly safe R. The other 3 seats were drawn mostly arbitrarily, we have CD1 (blue, 40% white, 40% hispanic), CD2 (green, 38% white, 38% hispanic, 15% black), and CD3 (purple, 66% white) picking up the Las Vegas area. Looking at those percentages, I’m surprised the VRA hasn’t come up more when discussing Nevada redistricting, I wouldn’t be shocked if the new seat is considered VRA (assuming Dave’s numbers are correct).
Oklahoma 7
Another state I’ve never been in and aren’t terribly familiar with. Despite the reasonably high non-white population, I don’t see any way to draw a VRA district here, especially as it would be a black-hispanic-native coalition district.
CD1 (blue, 74% white, 10% hispanic) and CD2 (green, 76% white, 10% native) are on the Texas border, and I assume would behave similarly to northern Texas seats. CD5 (yellow, 76% white, 11% native) is similarly on the Kansas border.
We have a compact CD3 (58% white, 17% black, 16% hispanic) in Oklahoma City, and a larger CD4 (78% white) surrounding it to the east.
CD6 (teal, 67% white, 12% black, 11% hispanic) contains most of the Tulsa area, and CD7 (gray, 70% white, 15% native) covers eastern Oklahoma. I assume CD7 would be the closest equivalent to Dan Boren’s district. Apart from that and CD3, I assume everything is safe R.
Oregon 9
A state so fun I did it twice. The first was relatively neutral, the second time turned into what I believe is a GOP gerrymander.
As much as a map can when adding 4 districts, this looks similar to the current map. We have a large eastern CD1 (blue), a coastal CD2 (green) containing medford, and a CD3 (purple) containing Bend and Eugene.
CD4 (red) contains Corvalis and what looks like semi-rural Western Oregon, CD5 (purple) is Salem based. CD6 (teal) is the northwest corner of the state, and reaches into the Portland suburbs.
I don’t think it really matters how the lines are drawn for CD7 through 9, all should be safe D.
The most obvious change is that Eastern Oregon. is split between two districts. CD2 (green) contains Medford and southeast Oregon, while CD3 (purple) contains Bend and northeast Oregon. We also gain a very coastal CD1 (blue).
Now this is a gerrymander. CD4 (red) contains the cities of Eugene, Corvalis, Albany, and Salem and very little else. CD5 (yellow) surrounds it and covers other rural areas.
As the northeast coast isn’t being drawn into Portland districts now, there are 4 districts entirely within this shot instead of just 3.
It’s not that fun without partisan data though. I’d be interested in seeing say, New York with a drastically reduced number of seats (3-5).
any earthquake rattling changes to census data this year.
Yes perhaps the 1st change to South Carolina in decades is big. Apparently the 1st pause in additions for CA appears to be huge. I might add there is an outside chance of a lost seat for that state. That would be a shock.
No small state gets a second seat nor does a small state lose a seat.
Thanks for posting these maps–I looked at map for 1970 Iowa the other day. Yup it was 7 seats and now it apparently will be down to 4.
Big day next week.