At first glance, the GOP appears to be doing as well as it can in TN. They control the governor’s mansion, state leg, both senate seats, and every house seat outside of the two in Memphis and Nashville. But the seemingly ironclad Democratic stronghold of Nashville is actually possible for the GOP to crack. TN-05, which encompasses the city, has a PVI of D+3, which is low enough that it can be split among the heavily Republican precincts surrounding Nashville without doing too much damage to the GOP reps in those districts. And TN-05 is also 70% white, so the VRA does not provide an obstacle. I have attempted to draw a map that successfully cracks Nashville, giving the GOP 8 reps, without weakening the surrounding districts (especially the 8th, held by potentially vulnerable freshman Stephen Fincher, aka the gospel singer from Frog Jump).
Nashville Area:
Memphis Area:
The first step is to take the 9th and turn it into a Democratic vote dump, stretching it out to eat up some African American areas in the rural areas around Memphis. The 8th then comes down and takes the suburban Memphis areas currently in the fifth as well as most of the white areas currently in the 9th (leaving out the more liberal white areas). The new 9th is 23% white, 69% black whereas the old district was 36% white, 60% black. The idea here is to make the districts surrounding Memphis more conservative so that they can take Democratic parts of Nashville.
Nashville itself is split between the 8th, the 7th, and the 6th here. The 5th now encompasses only a small part of Nashville and now includes many more conservative suburban and rural counties. The 8th now stretches along the border of the state from Memphis to Nashville, having given up many rural areas to the 7th to make up for the 7th losing some of the Memphis suburban areas (more on why I did this trade-off later). Likewise, the 4th now stretches much further west into territory previously in the 7th to make up for the population that was taken out of the 4th and given to the 5th. The 6th is probably the least changed of all the districts used to split Nashville. It is still relatively compact and composed mainly of the northern suburbs of Nashville with some of urban Nashville thrown in. All three districts in the east are basically unchanged.
Demographics for all changed districts:
TN-09: 23% White, 69% Black, 5% Hispanic (Previously 36% W, 60% B, 3% H)
TN-08: 73% W, 20% B (Prev 75% W, 22% B)
TN-07 80% W, 12% B (Prev 85% W, 12% B)
TN-06 83% W, 11% B (Prev 90% W, 6% B)
TN-05 79% W, 10% B, 7% H (Prev 70% W, 24% B, 4% H)
TN-04 90% W, 6% B (Prev 93% W, 4% B)
Of all these districts, the one that needed to be protected the most was the 8th. The 8th was the most Democratic district in TN outside of Memphis or Nashville before, and the demographic changes seem to suggest that it has most a point or two more to the left with this redistricting. However, it has also become much more suburban and much less rural. This is very important, because while the rural areas have a very long history of electing blue dog democrats, the suburbs around Memphis are much more conservative and are solidly GOP at a local and national level, unlike the rural areas where Democrats still compete locally. Overall, the PVI of this district probably hasn’t changed too much, but I would suspect that it is now a good deal safer for Fincher.
I’m not actually sure that the GOP will do something like this, even though they probably could. It is a pretty atrocious looking map, and even though no majority-minority districts are split, it has looks a lot like something that would have happened in the pre-civil rights era south. There’s also not that much to be gained here; it’s only one congressional seat that we’re talking about. In the end, something like this, while possible, is probably not going to happen. But that doesn’t make it any less fun to draw. 🙂
I think the Reps need to tdefinately hink about making Tenn 5 rep leaning by making surrounding Tenn 6 and 7 which could stand to lose some rep voters less rep to get to a 8-1 map. I think the lines could be a little smoother in the western part than your map and accomplish this but why give Cooper a D+3 seat when his could easily be made R+3 or better without impacting the surrounding 2 districts (Black, Blackburn) to where a Dem could win! Tenn 9 needs to gain pop so it should extend and add some dem voters from tenn 8 which will improve Fincher! 8-1 is def doable, will be interesting to see what R’s do here!
and my home in Memphis would be linked with North Nashville. I shake my head at the idea of it. Mind you TN7 has linked parts of Shelby county and Davidson county for 30 years.
To lock up TN8 you can swap territory in Shelby and Montgomery county and add about 4% or so to the republican side. Swap a few counties and make TN4 several % more GOP and you can lock up 7-2.
For years the democrats in TN more or less conceded TN1 & TN2 plus the Willaimson/East Shelby county seat. They drew favorable lines for the democrats in CD4-CD6-CD8 but did not mess with the GOP seats. TN has a fairly long history of fairly concise compact seats. In 2001 the democrats could have connected CD4 to inner Chattonoga or Knoxville but we just don’t that here in TN.
My crystal ball says 7-2.
I must admit its a stunning map. I know some of the exact areas you have moved around here in West TN and its like a jig saw puzzle with just the right pieces cut out to accomplish what purpose you had in mind.
But if Democrats are going to unpack Chicago and wreck havoc with the Illinois map, Republicans have every reason to be looking at second-tier opportunities like the one they have in Tennessee. There are plenty of reasons to believe that Tennessee will continue to move to the right, as its white population votes more Democratic than do the whites in most other Deep South states.
Of course, that may not stop Republicans. Nashville is trending more Democratic and since electoral trends are unpredictable, a map like this may not work out like it was planned.
is that Cooper is much more conservative than your average Dem representing a D+3 district. Plus you cave him back much of the area he represented as the 4ths congressman in the early 90s. I’d say Cooper can probably win easily in anything up to R+7 and would be safe except for a 2010-like year in anything up to about R+12.
I imagine the real plan will be far less ugly than this. I do like what you’ve done by packing the 9th even more, but I think Cooper’s district will be mildly altered to encompass more suburban areas, perhaps pushing it from D+3 to, say, R+3. That’s enough to keep too many R votes from being wasted on Cooper and putting others in jeopardy, but also to give a good chance he won’t be succeeded by another Democrat in the 5th.
I think TN-09 on this map will look a lot like the one Republicans will draw up. I doubt the GOP will be so ambitious in Nashville. In my opinion they’ll reshape TN-05 into a 50/50 district. That being said, this map is no uglier than the current one that they have and would most likely result in a 8-1 split.
I think making TN-09 69% black by putting a bunch of pieces of other counties with it would be an illegal racial gerrymander and would be struck down by the courts. It’s only 60% now, and bringing it up that high would make it the most African-American district in the country.
in making TN-5 a little (emphasis on a little) more R to maybe contest it when Cooper retires, but I don’t think it’s necessarily a sure thing either. Nashville is growing and trending blue, and who knows when Cooper will retire- it may be a long time. By then it may not work.
On a more general note, I think Tennessee’s districts can afford to be cleaned up a lot without endangering any incumbent. TN-03 in particular is absolutely hideous, and all of East TN is so Republican that there’s no need for a district shaped like that.