6d ago

Democrats go nuclear in redistricting arms race

www.axios.com

...The proposed Texas map is designed to net the GOP up to five House seats — potentially enough to decide the majority...

Outside Texas, key Democratic governors have launched an aggressive counteroffensive to try to neutralize the GOP's redistricting push.

...Newsom, who's made no secret of his presidential ambitions, has openly accused Trump of "rigging" the midterms and suggested California could redraw its map to eliminate all nine GOP-held seats.

[New York Gov. Kathy Hochul] called Monday for disbanding New York's independent redistricting commission and embracing partisan hardball, telling reporters that she's "tired of fighting this fight with my hand tied behind my back...I cannot ignore that the playing field has changed dramatically, and shame on us if we ignore that fact and cling tight to the vestiges of the past," Hochul said.

23 comments

fucking bullshit.
GOP, and texas in particular, started it. All they had to do was not gerrymander more than it already is, and CA and other states wouldn't respond in kind.
But fucking hell. Either it's illegal for everyone, or its legal and fair for everyone. So make this about Texas being controlling assholes instead.
It's about fucking time Democrats started acting like they're in a fight for the existence of the US.
- If the republicans want to ban gerrymandering on a federal level I'm all for it. They can stop this bullshit that easily
  
  Wouldn't they lose about 20 seats that way? They aren't interested in democracy.
Its about time. Contemporary US voters no longer care about who's taking the highest road. The nazis need to be stopped by any means necessary.
Decades late and a dollar short.
Fascism is a danger to Democracy. Republicans = Fascists. They are actively trying to end democracy in America, and need to be stopped by any means necessary. It looks like we won’t be executing fascists in the streets, much to my dismay- but using dirty or even illegal tactics have to be 100% on the table because if the fascists win we will never have a democracy again
This is exactly what SCOTUS wanted. Now they are getting it.
I mean okay, nice of you idiots to finally play the game that Republicans have been playing for FORTY YEARS. It's a bit of a too little, too late kind of a things at this point but still nice to see Democrats finally, FINALLY understanding you can't take the damn "high road" and expect to win Calvin ball.
We must do everything in our power to deprive republicans of status, power, even their fucking vote. They are traitor filth.
It's all bad for voters. No matter what party, consolidated power is not good for voters who want advancement, progress, or even just small small steps in the right direction.
How does changing New York's redistricting rules help defeat Texas Republicans? Or prevent Florida Republicans or Ohio Republicans or Iowa Republicans or etc. from doing their own bullshit redistricting?
- It doesn’t, but the idea is that overtly partisan districting in blue states can compensate the overtly partisan districts in red states and keep the house as a whole in balance.
  The obvious problem is that this solution disenfranchises not just the minority voters in red and blue states, but also the majority voters. Non competitive elections are the death of democracy, and benefit only donors, machine politicians and corruption.
  
  Things needs to get bad everywhere before people ask for something better. The US is in the middle of a right wing coup.
- Land doesn't vote. People do. Redistrict all of the rural areas in any state to include even a single large city in that state and the whole country will be blue. Fascists have been doing it the opposite way for years.
  If enough blue states do it, it will directly counter the fascist push to do the same because without cheating, they just don't have the numbers.
  
  Yes, anti-fascists have to play the same game as fascists. None of this "when they go low..." shit can stand anymore.
  But I have a little bone to pick with your first statement: at the state level, that holds up (depending on the state), but at the federal level, land (ok, less populous states) has an outsized influence because of the permanent apportionment law from almost 100 years ago.
  Every California house member serves about 760k people, where Wyoming has 576k people total.
  That means 9.5M ((760k - 576k) x 52 seats) people in CA (or 16.4 Wyomings) effectively don't get a say every time the house votes.
  And it's even worse when we get to the electoral college (sum of House and Senate members per state). Wyoming has 192k people per electoral vote and CA has 732k people per electoral vote.
  So it's not entirely fair to dismiss the people vs land vote.
- No moral highground please. We are at war.
  
  You are at war.
  But, to continue the metaphor, this is like blowing up your own bridges so they can’t be used by the advancing enemy. Sometimes it’s necessary, but it’s not something you should celebrate. You are sacrificing important strategic instruments of prosperity for temporary tactical advantage.
- It’s all about seats in the House.
- What makes you think they won't, or haven't already?
  Gerrymandering is an old technique, and (tragically) ingrained in US politics. The difference now is how boldly and specifically the lines can be drawn to gain an unfair advantage.
  Whether or not California does it, you can count on Ohio and Florida doing their worst.
  
  Exactly. Ohio and Florida are the way they are because they got so gerrymandered that they suffered brain drain and rapidly shifted red
Shitty graphic

23 comments