NEW: for the first time, Dems have taken the lead on @CookPolitical's 2022 redistricting scorecard. After favorable developments in NY, AL, PA et. al., they're on track to net 2-3 seats from new maps vs. old ones.* pic.twitter.com/7DsP5LEDD0
— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) February 3, 2022
*Evergreen disclaimer: this doesn't mean Dems are on track to gain House seats *overall* in 2022. A 2-3 seat redistricting gain is significant, but a 42% Biden approval rating could be worth several dozen seats to the GOP in November.
— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) February 3, 2022
Trump today has implicated McConnell in both having the electoral votes forwarded to him, and in NY’s redistricting map.
— Aaron Blake (@AaronBlake) February 6, 2022
McConnell has no actual role in either. https://t.co/XV9KF8vO2C
FWIW, I contacted the writer, @reidepstein, about the inaccuracies, and he admitted he didn't have independent access to the district-level data. But he refused to revisit/correct. 🤷
— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) February 6, 2022
Reid Epstein and Nick Corasaniti at NYT:
New York’s new map doesn’t just set Democrats up to win more seats, it also eliminates competitive districts. In 2020, there were four districts where Mr. Biden and former President Donald J. Trump were within five percentage points. There are none in the new map. Even the reconfigured district that stretches from Republican-dominated Staten Island to Democratic neighborhoods in Brooklyn is now, at least on paper, friendly territory for Democrats.
Without that competition from outside the party, many politicians are beginning to see the biggest threat to their careers as coming from within.“When I was a member of Congress, most members woke up concerned about a general election,” said former Representative Steve Israel of New York, who led the House Democrats’ campaign committee during the last redistricting cycle. “Now they wake up worried about a primary opponent.”Mr. Israel, who left Congress in 2017 and now owns a bookstore on Long Island, recalled Republicans telling him they would like to vote for Democratic priorities like gun control but feared a backlash from their party’s base. House Democrats, Mr. Israel said, would like to address issues such as Social Security and Medicare reform, but understand that doing so would draw a robust primary challenge from the party’s left wing.
...
“The parties are contributing to more and more single-party districts and taking the voters out of the equation,” said former Representative Tom Davis, who led the House Republicans’ campaign arm during the 2001 redistricting cycle. “November becomes a constitutional formality.”
...
The phenomenon of parties using redistricting to gain an edge is as old as the republic itself, but it has escalated in recent decades with more sophisticated technology and more detailed data about voter behavior. Americans with similar political views have clustered in distinct areas — Republicans in rural and exurban areas, Democrats in cities and inner suburbs. It’s a pattern that can make it difficult to draw cohesive, competitive districts.
