Swing State Project

Elway Poll (9/9-12, likely voters, 6/9-13 in parens):

Patty Murray (D-inc): 50 (47)

Dino Rossi (R): 41 (40)

Undecided: 9 (13)

(MoE: ±4.5%)

I’d actually spent some time wondering this weekend when Elway was ever going to get around to polling the Washington Senate race again. (Hmmm. Maybe I need to have more exciting weekends.) Lo and behold, they have done so, and the results have to be pretty heartening to Democrats, who’ve probably been worried about this race in view of seeing Dino Rossi with small leads according to the latest SurveyUSA and Rasmussen offerings.

So who are these Elway clowns who dare challenge the conventional wisdom, the non-Washingtonians among you may be asking? They have probably the longest and most solid reputation among local pollsters, and more importantly, a track record of being right before it’s fashionable to do so. For instance, at this point two years ago in mid-September of 2008, when Rasmussen was giving Dino Rossi a 52-46 lead over Chris Gregoire and SurveyUSA a 48-47 Rossi lead, Elway was seeing a 48-44 advantage for Gregoire. (Gregoire went on to win by 6.)

Elway finds that Murray leads 61-30 in the Democratic stronghold of King County, pretty consistent with her 59% performance in the Top 2 primary… and pretty inconsistent with SurveyUSA’s odd finding that Murray and Rossi were tied in the Seattle metro area (although they may have meant that descriptor to include Pierce and Snohomish Counties as well).

The D-trip is out with four new internal polls showing Democratic incumbents in the lead.

KY-06: Grove Insight for the DCCC (9/7-9, likely voters):

Ben Chandler (D-inc): 52

Andy Barr (R): 38

(MoE: ±4.9%)

NM-02: Anzalone Liszt for the DCCC (9/7-9, likely voters):

Harry Teague (D-inc): 51

Steve Pearce (R): 44

(MoE: ±4.9%)

OR-05: Grove Insight for the DCCC (9/7-9, likely voters):

Kurt Schrader (D-inc): 42

Scott Bruun (R): 29

(MoE: ±4.9%)

PA-12: Grove Insight for the DCCC (9/7-9, likely voters):

Mark Critz (D-inc): 48

Tim Burns (R): 41

(MoE: ±4.9%)

By: Inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

The country Poland is comprised of two main political parties; the first is Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc  (PiS) – “Law and Justice” in English. This party is a populist group which runs upon anti-corruption and anti-Communist credentials. The second party is the Platforma Obywatelska (PO) – in English the “Civic Platform” – a group espousing support for free market capitalism.

On October 2007, Poland held parliamentary elections between the two parties. Most of the Western media backed the Civic Platform (PO), disliking the unpredictability of the Kaczynski twins (leaders of Law and Justice). Here is a map of the results:

More below.

As it turns out, the Civic Platform (PO) won the election, taking 41.5% of the vote. Law and Justice polled 32.1%, with the rest of the vote going to third parties.

A clear regional split is apparent in these results. Poland’s southeast – with the exception of Warsaw – generally voted for Law and Justice (PiS). On the other hand, support for the Civic Platform (PO) took a sickle-like shape along Poland’s northern and western borders.

These patterns are not random. Take a look at pre-WWI Imperial Germany superimposed upon this map:

As the map above indicates, there is a powerful correlation between the borders of Imperial Germany and support for the free-market, pro-Western Civic Platform (PO) Party. In contrast, areas that voted strongest for Law and Justice (PiS) used to belong to the Austrian-Hungarian and Russian empires.

An exact map of Poland’s pre-WWI boundaries looks as so:

These voting patterns have very little to do with any actual German presence in pro-Civic Platform regions. Few Germans live in the regions that used to belong to Imperial Germany; after WWII the process of ethnic cleansing effectively expelled them all from modern-day Poland.

The reason, rather, involves economics. The German Empire was far more economically developed than the Russian and Austria-Hungarian empires. This legacy is still present today, as Poland’s 2007 parliamentary elections showed quite starkly.

An interesting instance of Poland’s “German” divide occurred during the 1989 parliamentary elections. One may recognize this date: it was the year that communism fell in Poland. In these elections the Polish communists actually competed directly with the anti-communist Solidarity movement.

Here are the results:

Solidarity, of course, won in a landslide victory – which is why communism fell in Poland. Yet even in these elections one can make out the regional, east-west divide in Poland. Surprisingly, the more “Western” and economically developed regions actually gave stronger support to the Communists.

All in all, Poland’s electoral divide provides a powerful example of how long-past history can influence even the most modern events. Whatever the political parties of Poland’s future, and whatever their political positions, one can be fairly sure that Polish elections will continue to replicate the boundaries of pre-WWI Germany for a long, long time.

• AK-Sen: Lisa Murkowski is still mum on the prospects of a write-in run, but this looks like a potentially important tea leaf: she isn’t returning to the Beltway as the Senate goes back into session, but is remaining in Alaska attending to… something. Maybe it’s the grieving process, but it’s also shades of how Bob Bennett behaved while he weighed his post-primary recourse. And while this hadn’t looked likely in a week, Libertarian candidate David Haase confirmed he won’t step down to make way for Murkowski on the Libertarian line… so it’s write-in or bust for her.

• DE-Sen: With everyone abuzz over last night’s PPP poll giving Christine O’Donnell an improbable lead in the GOP primary, there’s word today of a Mike Castle internal giving him a 7-point lead (it’s buried deep in this Politico article, with no further details). PPP has some further thoughts on their poll, pointing out that in some ways Castle might be in worse shape than Lisa Murkowski going into the primary: his faves among GOP voters were 43/47, compared with Murk’s 48/46, and 55% thought he was too liberal, compared to 47% in Alaska. At any rate, the right wing is still engaged in full court press on O’Donnell’s behalf, though, with Sarah Palin cutting a radio ad for her. And if you’re like me, you were spending a lot of time last night trying to mentally ballpark how big an impact on an O’Donnell win would have on overall odds of retaining the Senate… well, don’t worry, because Nate Silver has already figured it out for you.

• ME-Sen: So after Murkowski and Castle, which GOPer is next on the chopping block? Looks like it’s Olympia Snowe, looking ahead to 2012. PPP finds that only 29% of Republicans are committed to backing Snowe in that year’s primary, with 63% saying they’ll back a more conservative alternative. Snowe loses a hypothetical primary matchup with 2006 gubernatorial nominee Chandler Woodcock, 38-33.

• NH-Sen: GOP pollster Magellan is out with a last-minute pre-primary look at the GOP Senate field, and they find the closest result yet for late-surging Ovide Lamontagne. It still doesn’t look likely he can pull out the upset unless somehow an extra week or two of stoppage time got added to the election’s clock (based on the rate at which he’s closing), but he’s within 4. The poll puts it at Kelly Ayotte 35, Lamontagne 31, Bill Binnie 14, Jim Bender 10.

• CO-Gov: Could the Colorado GOP find itself a “minor party” in 2012, mostly just an embarrassment but also something that affects where they’re positioned on the ballot? That’s what would happen if Dan Maes somehow finds himself gaining less than 10% of the vote in November’s gubernatorial race.

• MN-Gov: In a convoluted way, this is likely to help Dem nominee Mark Dayton. The former moderate Republican governor, Arne Carlson, announced that he’s backing the IP nominee, Tom Horner, and will be stumping on his behalf today. That may give some a nice outlet to moderate Republican rank-and-file loath to the too-far-right-for-Minnesota Tom Emmer but who can’t bring themselves to vote DFL.

• OR-Gov: Chris Dudley’s attempts to game the system vis-à-vis the clashing tax structures of Washington and Oregon get dicier the more the media look into it, maybe to the extent of actual tax avoision. (It’s a word. Look it up.) Long story short: he moved his primary residence from Oregon to Washington because Washington doesn’t have income tax (he still had to pay tax on his Trail Blazers salary, but not on capital gains and dividends). However, it’s come to light that not only did he not sell his Portland home, but he just kept on using it at least part-time for years after switching his domicile.

• TX-Gov (pdf): The Texas Tribune is out with another poll of the Texas gubernatorial race via the University of Texas, and they find that while Rick Perry has a decent lead, he’s far from putting the race away yet. Perry leads Dem Bill White 39-33, with 5 for Libertarian Kathie Glass, and 1 for “Green Party” plant Deb Shafto. Dems are losing all the statewide downballot races as well, although Hank Gilbert’s in striking distance in the Agriculture Commissioner race (down 33-26 to Todd Staples).

• LA-02: Despite the warm relations between Barack Obama and GOP Rep. Joe Cao, Obama isn’t going easy on Cao. Obama just gave his endorsement to Dem primary winner Cedric Richmond in a statement last night.

• MD-01: Wow, still no love lost between Wayne Gilchrest and the man who teabagged him to death in the 2008 GOP primary before teabagging was fashionable, Andy Harris. Gilchrest jumped into the fray with an endorsement for Harris’s self-funding primary opponent, Rob Fisher.

• NY-15: Clinton alert, times 4! Hot on the heels of support from Michael Bloomberg for Charlie Rangel ahead of tomorrow’s primary, Bill Clinton (maybe the 15th’s most famous commercial tenant) just cut a robocall on Rangel’s behalf too. The Big Dog is also making campaign appearances in three different gubernatorial races: stumping with Dan Onorato in Pennsylvania today, Mark Dayton in Minnesota tomorrow, and Rory Reid in Nevada on Wednesday.

• DCCC: At SSP, we’re all about The Size Of The Buy, and National Journal has sussed out which of the DCCC’s round of 60 reservations are the biggest ones. There are at least a dozen districts where they’ve reserved $1 million or more: MO-04, NV-03, NH-01, AZ-01, CA-11, AL-02, AZ-05, IN-09, ND-AL, PA-03, and (no surprise here, giving Larry Kissell’s fundraising fail) NC-08. Interestingly, they’re also putting $1.8 million in to FL-25, where they’re on the offensive, a sign of a lot of confidence in Joe Garcia’s chances. (The story also details some investments in big markets where there are multiple races and it’s unclear which races will get the money.)

• AFL-CIO: The AFL-CIO is spending big on a gigantic direct mail binge, hitting 2 million households of members. (They’ll also be making 4 million follow-up phone calls.) The six Senate races involved are NV-Sen, MO-Sen, WI-Sen, IL-Sen, FL-Sen, and PA-Sen; the four gubernatorial races are OR-Gov, OH-Gov, IL-Gov, and MI-Gov. There are also 24 House districts (see the link for more).

• SSP TV:

• NV-Sen: Harry Reid’s newest ad targets Sharron Angle’s “extreme and dangerous” legislative record, focusing on voting against allowing out-of-state restraining orders to be enforced in Nevada

• FL-12: Dennis Ross goes after Dem Lori Edwards, tying her to Obama

• FL-22: Ron Klein moves past the who-cares lien stuff and gets on to the juicy stuff regarding Allen West’s statements about Social Security and Medicare

• MS-01: Another Travis Childers spot goes negative on Alan Nunnelee, hitting him on the regressive “Fair Tax”

• Rasmussen:

• CT-Gov: Dan Malloy (D) 46%, Tom Foley (R) 39%

• IL-Gov: Pat Quinn (D-inc) 37%, Bill Brady (R) 50%, Rich Whitney (G) 4%

• SD-Gov: Scott Heidepriem (D) 28%, Dennis Daugaard (R) 57%

Mason-Dixon for Las Vegas Review-Journal (9/7-9, likely voters, 8/23-25 in parentheses):

Harry Reid (D-inc): 46 (45)

Sharron Angle (R): 44 (44)

Other: 1 (2)

None of these: 3 (4)

Undecided: 6 (5)

(MoE: ±4%)

There’s very little movement in the Nevada Senate race; most everyone has decided and it’s a game of inches. Tea Party candidate Scott Ashjian is in better shape after a U.S. District Court judge dismissed a suit intended to keep Ashjian off the ballot, saying the time for legal challenges was long ago. Of course, with “Other” (not just Ashjian, but also the AIP candidate) polling at 1%, that really doesn’t mater one iota.

Gubernatorial numbers:

Rory Reid (D): 36 (31)

Brian Sandoval (R): 52 (53)

Other: 2 (2)

None of these: 2 (3)

Undecided: 8 (11)

(MoE: ±4%)

Jon Ralston has teased the existence of some other poll that has Reid the Younger within 9 (saying “he’s not dead yet”), which we’ll be on the lookout for. That, plus Ralston-tweeted word of another Reid internal that has him within 7, and the trendlines here, suggest that Reid somehow has gotten some momentum. Is there enough time left to capitalize, though?

NV-03 numbers (trendlines from 8/9-11):

Dina Titus (D-inc): 47 (43)

Joe Heck (R): 43 (42)

Other: 1 (3)

None of these: 2 (4)

Undecided: 7 (8)

(MoE: ±5%)

One other race where there’s some Democratic progress — and where it may actually affect the bottom line — is the 3rd, where Dina Titus moved from a 1-point edge to a 4-point edge, and closer to the 50% mark. It’s pretty easy to diagnose what happened there, though: the AFSCME poured $750K into the district on Titus’s behalf. Now if we could just get them to do that in about 30 or 40 other districts, then we’d be in pretty good shape overall.

If you’re wondering about the state’s downballot offices, they’re all crammed in there too. GOPer Brian Krolicki is poised to return for another turn as Lt. Governor, while the Dems, including sorta-embattled AG Catherine Cortez Masto, are winning the other four races.

AK-Sen: As of Friday, Lisa Murkowski was saying that she still hasn’t made a decision about whether to pursue a write-in bid. At least one major Republican is opposed to the idea: Sen. John Cornyn says that Murkowski would have to quit her job as vice chair of the NRSC if she goes the third-party route. I also wonder if her Senate committee spots might be in jeopardy, too. Anyhow, Eric Ostermeier of the University of Minnesota’s excellent Smart Politics blog has a good post on the history of write-in campaigns in the Land of the Midnight Sun. In eight statewide contests, the best-ever score in a senate race was 17%, and 26% in a gubernatorial race. I actually think those numbers aren’t bad at all!

More importantly, we’re very close to our fundraising goal for Dem Scott McAdams. So far, 61 people have donated $2,080. I’d love to see us hit our goal of $2,400 – the equivalent of one maximum federal donation – by the end of this week. Think we can do it? Help make it happen!

DE-Sen: While everyone’s still abuzz about last night’s poll numbers, there’s some other DE-Sen news worth reporting. For one, the NRA endorsed Christine O’Donnell. For another, so did Sen. Jim DeMint, Kingmaker of Loons. For yet another, Sarah Palin recorded a robocall for O’Donnell, playing up their shared sense of victimhood.

Meanwhile, The Hill says that the Tea Party Express has spent some $300K on radio and TV ads on O’Donnell’s behalf, but it’s a little hard to double-check that since TPX’s FEC filings seem to use, shall we say, “new math.” Finally, a reporter asked Mike Castle if he’d pursue an independent bid if he lost the primary. (DE’s laws are apparently similar to Alaska’s in this regard.) Castle was surprisingly non-committal, saying he’d “have to give it thought.”

GA-Sen: Big Dog Alert (retroactive)! Bill Clinton was in Atlanta late last week to do a fundraiser for Labor Comm’r Michael Thurmond, the Dem senate nominee challenging GOPer Johnny Isakson. Thurmond, as you’d expect, was a big-time Hillary Clinton supporter.

IA-Sen: Chuck Grassley, making a play for the dirty old man vote, had this to say when asked why he didn’t once look at opponent Roxanne Conlin during a recent debate:

“I wish you had told me because I would have been very happy to look at her. She’s a very nice looking woman.”

NH-Sen: The New Hampshire Union Leader has been combing through a batch of emails released by the NH attorney general’s office pursuant to a freedom of information request, and they’ve turned up a doozy: Then-AG Kelly Ayotte used her official email account to discuss campaign strategy with a guy who later became one of her consultants. In better news for Ayotte, Sarah Palin recorded a robocall for her, too (see DE-Sen item above), but man is this imagery getting crazy: She calls Ayotte a “Granite Grizzly.” Zuh? Anyhow, Jim DeMint’s also decided to get involved here (again, see DE-Sen), endorsing surging wingnut Ovide Lamontagne.

NV-Sen: Jon Ralston has the complete tick-tock on how he got Harry Reid and Sharron Angle to agree to a debate on his show – only to have Angle, in a spasm of campaign dysfunction, pull out, despite being the one to throw down the challenge to Reid in the first place.

AK-Gov: Anchorage attorney Bill Walker, who drew about 30% in his primary against Gov. Sean Parnell (thanks to $300K in self-funding), says he’s still waiting to see if either the Alaskan Independence Party or Libertarian Party candidates withdraw from the race. If there’s a drop-out by Wednesday, Walker could take that spot for the general election.

HI-Gov: A new robopoll by Aloha Vote (taken for online news service Civil Beat) shows ex-Rep. Neil Abercrombie beating Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann by 48-31 in the Democratic primary. That’s a pretty different picture from a Ward Research survey a few weeks ago which had Abercrombie leading just 49-44.

NY-Gov: It’s been a long time since anyone has come out with any interesting statewide poll numbers in New York, but with just days to go before the primary, Siena has finally managed to surprise us (well, sorta): They show scuzzbucket businessman Carl Paladino in a dead heat with ex-Rep. Rick Lazio, trailing just 43-42. In mid-August, Lazio had a 43-30 lead, so this is all Paladino surge. The rest of the numbers (which test the senate races) are all meh – click the link if you want `em.

In other NY-Gov news, the Working Families Party decided to endorse Andrew Cuomo, and Cuomo – who had kept the WFP at arms’ length for a long time – accepted. A federal investigation of the WFP was recently dropped, which seemingly helped smooth things. The party was in a very tough spot, though, as without Cuomo on their ballot spot, there was no real path for them to get the 50,000 votes they needed to avoid losing their ballot line. So I’m guessing there may be more to this story.

CO-03: What is wrong with GOPer Scott Tipton?

“John Salazar, it’s time to come home,” Tipton said as he opened the debate. “It’s 9/11. Let’s roll.”

FL-25: Another mystery teabagger has (not really) come out of the woodwork. Roly Arrojo is running on the Florida Tea Party line, and it seems no one knows a thing about him, except for the fact that he hasn’t filed any FEC reports – except for a Statement of Candidacy in which he identified himself as a Democrat. Republicans are suggesting this is a Dem put-up job, but Joe Garcia’s camp is of course denying any knowledge of this guy. Interestingly, so is the head of the FL Tea Party!

ND-AL: I know, it sounds like parody, but Republican Rick Berg has a great idea: Drill for oil in North Dakota’s Theodore Roosevelt National Park! Not only is it, of course, illegal to do so, but it’s also a fucking national park!

NY-13: Republican Michael Allegretti just got bounced from the new teabaggish Taxpayers Party line, thanks to a lack of sufficient signatures. Rival Mike Grimm already has the Conservative line, come hell or high water.

NY-15: Of all people, Mayor Mike Bloomberg wound up recording a robocall for Rep. Charlie Rangel.

PA-08 (PDF): Yikes. Sophomore Dem Patrick Murphy just put out an internal from the Global Strategy Group showing him up by a mere 47-43 margin over the man he beat in 2006, Republican Mike Fitzpatrick. This is scary.

VA-05: The Weiner Watch continues: Republican Rob Hurt has already skipped two debates, and now he’s announced he’s skipping a third. Weiner!

Chicago-Mayor: Outgoing Chicago Mayor Richard Daley says he won’t make an endorsement in the race to succeed him.

NY-AG (PDF): Siena also released some final attorney general numbers, finding Eric Schneiderman narrowly in the lead at 25, with Kathleen Rice nipping his heels at 23. Sean Coffey is at 13, Richard Brodsky at 7, and Eric Dinallo at 4. The race has continued to get nasty in its final days, with Rice putting out a TV ad trying to link Schneiderman to scumbag state Sen. Pedro Espada, while a Schneiderman spot hits Rice for only becoming a Democrat in 2005.

DCCC: Blah blah blah, Dems not paying their DCCC dues. It’s old news, and I’m beyond sick of these stories, but not (only) for the reason you might expect. Oh yeah, I’m pissed at the schmucks who are holding out on their party for no discernible reason, but I’m also frustrated with the DCCC. We’ve repeatedly told them we want to help them raise money from their members – the netroots is not all-powerful, but we can bring some pressure on stingy Dems. But the DCCC steadfastly refuses to share their dues spreadsheet with us – even though they have no problem sharing it with the likes of Politico, and even though they actually promised to give us a copy at Netroots Nation. Not just obnoxious, but weirdly self-defeating.

SSP-TV:

• NV-Sen: Dem Sen. Harry Reid
• PA-Sen: Dem Joe Sestak
• CA-47: Dem Rep. Loretta Sanchez
• IA-02: Dem Rep. Dave Loebsack
• PA-08: GOPer Mike Fitzpatrick

Independent Expenditures:

• DE-Sen: Tea Party Express ($13K & $55K on media on behalf of Christine O’Donnell)
• MO-Sen: AFSCME ($43K on anti-Roy Blunt mailer)
• PA-Sen: CFG ($122K on anti-Joe Sestak ads)
• KY-06: NRCC ($96K on anti-Ben Chandler ads and polls from two different firms)

More generally, the NRCC’s IE arm said that it would go up with anti-Dem ads in eight districts (though no IE reports have yet been filed): AZ-01, AL-02, FL-02, MS-01, TN-08, TX-17, VA-05 & WI-07. A representative ad is available at the link.

This is a scenario if Republicans were to win the state House, this is a probable map since they already control the State Senate. (I’m pretty sure the legislature does this, or is it a commission?)

UPDATE: New proposed Columbus map in the comments (sorry mods if its too big!!), creating a safe Columbus (60%+ Obama, 200,000 African Americans) district and a likely Republican suburb district.

Cincinatti area:

OH-01:

Hamilton, Cincinatti suburbs

Steve Driehaus (D)*

Adds more Republican Butler County (avoiding West Chester, where Boehner lives) and loses all of the heavily black parts of Cincinatti (much like how Columbus’ district are already). Driehaus is D.O.A here, but he could run in the 3rd district, where the black parts of Cincinatti are in Jean Schmidt’s district. Eitherway, this district is a Republican one.

OH-02:

Middletown, Troy, West Chester

John Boehner (R)

Warps around Dayton, but still extremely Republican. Minority (or Majority) Leader Boehner is safe.

OH-03:

Most of Cincinatti, Portsmouth

Jean Schmidt (R)

Schmidt is screwed. That’s putting it nicely. If she only ecks out single-digit wins in an extremely conservative district, she won’t win here with all the new African-Americans in the district. I’m guessing Steve Dreihaus would run here, and the Republican gerrymander actually helps him surprisingly.

OH-04:

Dayton, Kettering, Springfield

Michael Turner (R)

Turner keeps his Dayton-area base and expands to Springfield via  Fairborn in Greene County. Also takes Mary Jo Kilroy’s  Madison and Union counties. Safe.

OH-05:

Lancaster, Beavercreek, Zanesville

Steve Austria (R)

Austria’s district expands to take in two of Zack Space’s most visible cities, Zanesville and Chillicothe.

OH-06:

Western Columbus and suburbs Most of Columbus

Mary Jo Kilroy (D)

Kilroy is probably slightly more safer, as ultra-conservative Union and Madison counties are out of her district and is entirely within Franklin County. Her race is still a toss-up to me though. Yeah nevermind, by making Kilroy safe, we also keep Pat Tiberi safe as well, which helps the GOP actually. Obama probably took in 64% in this district, so Kilroy can live another day. Now with exactly 200,161 African Americans!

OH-07:

Eastern Columbus, Delaware, Mount Vernon North and Eastern Columbus suburbs

Pat Tiberi (R)

What do you get when you combine extremely Republican counties outside of Columbus and the African-American heavy parts of Columbus? A swing district, like this one. Slightly a bit more African-American, Tiberi is still safe. Centered around Columbus makes Tiberi a whole lot safer, even if it helps another Democrat.

OH-08:

Lima, Findlay, Defiance

Jim Jordan (R)

Still the most conservative district in Ohio. Nothing to see here.

OH-09:

Bowling Green, Mansfield, Fremont

Bob Latta (R)

Mostly unchanged but expands into the Mansfield-area. Safe.

OH-10:

Toledo, Lorain, part of Elyria

Marcy Kaptur (D)

Expands to take in Lorain and parts of Elyria, safe for Kaptur.

OH-11:

Massilion, Kent, part of Elyria

Betty Sutton (D)

This district takes in Medina County and loses most of Akron. If this district was to be implemented, Sutton would probably lose this year.  Republican pickup.

OH-12:

Canton, Athens, New Philadelphia

Zack Space (D) vs John Boccieri (D) vs Charlie Wilson? (D)

WesternEastern Ohio’s population is dropping…fast. This district goes from Canton and swirvs its way down to Athens. Zack Space and John Boccieri both live here, but Charlie Wilson lives just right outside the boundaries but this area is still his. Who would win here? I’m guessing Wilson, but if he doesn’t run here i’d go with Space. Sorry John.

OH-13:

Youngstown, Steubenville, Warren

Tim Ryan (D) vs Charlie Wilson? (D)

This is where Charlie Wilson lives but most of this area is represented by Tim Ryan. Ryan is moderate enough for this district, so Wilson is in a predictament here.

OH-14:

Western Cleveland, part of Elyria

Dennis Kucinich (D)

Mostly the same but goes into Lorain County to pickup votes.

OH-15:

Eastern Cleveland, most of Akron

Marcia Fudge (D)

Here’s the district which bugged me the most. I’m not sure if it HAS to be majority-black, but i kept it that way anyways. stretches into Akron to take in African-American votes.

OH-16:

Mentor, Ashtabula, part of Akron

Steven LaTourette (R)

Slightly more Democratic due to the presence of Akron. LaTourette is still safe though.

More pictures:

Breakdown:

OH-01, OH-02, OH-04, OH-05, OH-07, OH-08, OH-09, OH-11,OH-16: Republican Seats

OH-03 (if Schmidt runs): Tossup seats

OH-10, OH-12, OH-13, OH-14, OH-15: Democratic Seats

6 Democratic Seats

1 Tossup seats

9 Republican Seats

If Schmidt doesn’t run:

10 Republican Seats

6 Democratic Seats

First redistricting diary, tell me what you think 🙂 (And no, i am not and will not do California. As much as i love my state, its too large and the precincts are annoying…Yes i’m talking to you Santa Clara and Kern Counties.)