A Look at Southern Texas Redistricting

I was working on an extended redistricting of Texas, but I accidentally closed out the file! I had saved it using an .RTF, but I don’t know how to open it (can anyone help with that??). But anyway, I did take a photoshot of Southern Texas before I closed out, and I think it might be worthwhile to examine what redistricting will look like along the border.

I used the 2010 Census numbers for this, so all follow the VRA. I also plugged in the partisan data for TX-23 and found that if you attach the district to San Angelo, you get a Obama 44% district and VAP of 59% Hispanic. Pretty cool!

I drew an extra fajita strip (purple) that went about 49% for Obama, while being around 60% VAP. The other Hispanic districts (TX-15, 20, 28, 35) are all around 70% VAP. The new TX27 (green) is safe for Farenthold (back-of-the-envelope calculations say that it went 41% for Obama).

Also, as you can see, McCaul is significantly safer, it’s now a 38% Obama district. However, and this is important, the estimations under the partisan data are wildly different than the actual Census numbers: the district is actually far more Hispanic under the 2010 numbers. In fact, it’s only 60% white VAP, and less so with the total numbers. Austin is far more Hispanic that one would imagine.

Also, Carter is made a lot safer in his district by removing Killeen to the super-duper red TX-11.

So tell me what you think! Sorry I don’t have the rest available–I will if someone helps me out. I do think this is what’s going to happen, though.