Pa. gerrymandering case: State Supreme Court releases new congressional map for 2018 elections

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: Philadelphia Daily News/Inquirer

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Monday released a new congressional district map to be used for the 2018 elections for U.S. House seats. Its plan splits only 13 counties. Of those, four counties are split into three districts and nine are split into two districts. It also includes significant changes to the state map, including dividing Philadelphia into only two congressional districts. By contrast the most recent map, enacted in 2011, split 28 counties.

The new map comes after weeks of political and legal fighting following the state high courts ruling that the map adopted in 2011 was an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander. But dont expect the map to end the battle.

Even before Mondays order, Republican lawmakers were vowing to challenge in federal court whatever map the court selected. The decision to take the mapmaking into the courts own hands, they argued, usurps the line-drawing power that the U.S. Constitution gives to state legislatures.And the court did not give them enough time to enact a new map.

Last month, the state high court ruled the congressional map unconstitutional and ordered a new one drawn in time for the May 15 primary election. The previous map, the justices said, violated the state constitutions guarantee that elections shall be free and equal by discriminating against Democratic voters, reducing their voting power in favor of Republicans.

Read more: http://www.philly.com/philly/news/politics/pennsylvania-gerrymandering-supreme-court-map-congressional-districts-2018-elections-20180219.html

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Updated with map (and edit to add that the Court completely re-numbered the districts) -

[Gothmog]

1. From my twitter feed

Link to tweet

[getagrip_already]

2. Any voting projections for the new districts?

Any estimate of how many seats it puts into play?

[BumRushDaShow]

3. I think at least 2

but the court completely re-numbered the districts so have to see what others...

[DeminPennswoods]

4. 12. 13, 14 and 15 will be solid R

although a populist Dem could take the 14th. The northern and central part of the state (The "T&quot are GOP strongholds.

[Wuddles440]

7. I think...

I'd put the 16th in that group as well.

[DeminPennswoods]

9. It will be much more competitive with

now all of Erie, New Castle, Sharon, Farrell.

[DeminPennswoods]

5. 2,3,4, 5 and 18 should be Democratic CD

That's basically Philly, MontCo, DelCo and Pittsburgh

[DeminPennswoods]

8. I think the new 16 and 17 are now in play

That means Rothfus and Kelly.

[DeminPennswoods]

17. Quick and dirty breakdown

Here's my off-the-top breakdown of the new CDs.

Solid D - 2, 3, 4, 5, 7 and 18 (total 6)
Solid R - 12, 13, 14 and 15 (total 4)
Lean D - 8
Lean R - 1, 6, 9, 10, 11, 14, 16 and 17

Under the 2011/current map, Dems have 5 solid seats, Rs have 13 solid seats.

Under the new map, Dems probably pick up 1 seat and 8 CDs get more competitive.

[BumRushDaShow]

25. Per this

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10141991921#post23

I might postulate (depending on where the cities like Reading, Wilkes-Barre/Scranton are falling) -

Solid D - 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 18
Lean D - 6, 8
Swing - 1, 14
Lean R - 9, 10, 11, 16, 17
Solid R - 12, 13, 15

I did the new PA-14 as a "Swing" because all 4 counties in the new PA-14 have majority Democratic voter registrations (PDF), but in their current configuration as the current PA-18 diluted with the current PA-9, they ended up as Lean-R & Solid-R.

[DeminPennswoods]

26. The new 14th might have D registration edge,

but these voters vote R. They just haven't changed their registration. If Dems have a chance here, it would be with a conserva/blue dog Dem, perhaps an elected county official, or a real fire-breathing economic populist.

One thing that did surprise me was the Court splitting Centre County. Penn State/State College looks to be right on the border making it hard to tell what CD it's in.

Also, neither of the candidates vying for the current 18th will be in the revised CD. Lamb (Mt Lebo) is in the new 12th and Saccone is in Doyle's new district (18).

[BumRushDaShow]

30. In an earlier iteration of the 12th

(which was modified to be the current 18th in 2011 and is now predominately the new 14th), Murtha was the rep there (from Johnstown and back into that SW corner) - and he was there for over 30 years. They loved him and he looked out for that area when it came to earmarks. It's harder now because "earmarks" ("pork" ) have become toxic lately.

I would agree that definitely a current "local" elected official - maybe one of county commissioners.

[DeminPennswoods]

28. Seeing where some of the cities/big towns are

Penn State University Park and State College are now in the new 12th.

Harrisburg and York are in the new 10th.

Reading is contained in the new 6th.

[BumRushDaShow]

29. Yup - did just hear a reporter mention that Reading was in the 6th

I figured that York may have been with Harrisburg but it was hard to tell.

[NewJeffCT]

35. The analysis I saw is that

Democrats picking up 1.5 seats because of this redistricting. So, at least 1 seat and possibly 2. And, if there are a few Lean R seats, I think Democrats could snag another with good turnout.

[arithia]

6. about frakin time!

I like how Harrisburg now appears to be with the rest of Dauphin county instead of shoved onto neighboring, whiter counties.

Go f*ck yourself, Lou Barletta.

[DeminPennswoods]

10. The state Rs had plenty of time to draw a map,

pass it, then negotiate with Wolf, or alternatively develop a new map with Wolf, then pass it. Instead, they wasted their time trying to get the USSC to intervene never even calling their members back into session for a vote.

If I were a judge hearing any appeal, my response would be "tough luck, you had your chance and didn't take it".

[BumRushDaShow]

11. Yes - according to my (D) State Senator

the GOP leaders refused to call either chamber into session leading up to the deadlines. So I can't see how they can argue that they "didn't have time" when they went on and submitted a joint map at the last minute anyway - but without a review or vote by the state legislature. Even if the GOP majority had voted for the leaders' map, they could have at least appeared to comply with the court. And Wolf even suggested they could pass a shell bill and have their map inserted into that when ready, but they didn't even bother to do that.

I know they are going to try to fight this all the way but the hope is that this whole process can be considered as based on the State Constitution and the GOP did not try to make an attempt at due diligence, thus not a federal matter.

[arithia]

12. SCOTUS already kicked this back to the state

And the GOP publicly refused to comply with the judges' orders to draw up a new map that was fair, instead turning in something just as gerrymandered for Gov Wolf to veto.

They can fight it all they want but they screwed themselves in the end.

[BumRushDaShow]

14. The danger though

is if they put in a "stay" to allow some fantastical court case to proceed and that would mean this map would not go into effect in time for 2018. I don't trust the SCOTUS (they are looking at a couple gerrymandering cases right now although our case is strictly a state Constitution thing), so hoping they don't decide to f* with us.

Wolf offered all kinds of options for the legislature though - including doing a quick vote on a "shell bill", so hopefully that is argument enough to show that there was no due diligence attempt by the GOP leaders. I.e., it is obvious they slow-walked the process to run out the clock on purpose so they could sue again and stall the process.

[DeminPennswoods]

16. This is at least the 2nd time the current map has lost in court

It was challenged in 2012, iirc, and lost, but since Rs controlled all 3 branches of govt, no change resulted.

The GOP should acknowledge that voters knew what we were doing when we elected a Dem majority to the supreme court and voted to extend mandatory retirement in order to keep Justice Baer.

[BumRushDaShow]

18. Yup. But no one willingly gives up power

and since they know the handwriting is on the wall for this year's mid-terms, they are going to fight tooth and nail to minimize any losses.

From what I understand from the article, those who are running in these districts have until March 20th to file nominating petitions, so that allows a month to rejigger and double-check any petitions already collected, so that they only represent people in the new district. I know those petitions will be a big "technicality" that the GOP will look at to try to disqualify candidates if this holds.

[Igel]

24. The claim I heard mooted was simple.

They had plenty of time to draw the map. 3 weeks.

But the court gave them the criteria only two days before the deadline.

"You'll have a test in three weeks."
"What over?"
"I'll tell you in 19 days. But you have three weeks to study."

Now, I find the claim specious. The criteria are what's in the Constitution. At the same time, I don't find that there's a remedy for legislative negligence specified in the Constitution, so their claim is as good as any other when I take off my (D) cap and put on my (0) cap. (By 0 I mean neither D nor R. Zero, as it that fine line between - and +.)

[BumRushDaShow]

31. The fact that Turzai & Scarnati produced a map and submitted it by the deadline

meant they could have called the legislature into a brief session before then to generate a "shell bill" and that map would be assumed to become a part of it, but they chose to slow-walk it to run out the clock and then go to court.

It's possible that because they DID submit a map, the governor reviewed it and then rejected it, meant that the court process was followed from the governor's standpoint - reviewing a map "submitted by the legislature" (via their leaders), although it was missing the actual legislation to formalize it.

Ironically the court's map, which wasn't exactly like any of the submissions, was pretty close to most of them.

[skip fox]

13. How likely is this to occur in other states

in the near or far future?

[BumRushDaShow]

20. It may vary state to state

Here in PA, the lawsuit that prevailed was through the state court system as the map was a clear violation of the state Constitution.

I know the SCOTUS is looking at other states where they took on the issue of gerrymandering (I think the main one was Wisconsin) and when PA tried the federal route, the lower court indicated that it had no way to determine what "gerrymandering" meant and at what point boundaries could be considered "gerrymandered". I expect that is what will be/has been argued by other states in the SCOTUS cases in order to establish/codify what is meant by "gerrymandered" and at what point might one need to take action.

Meanwhile the PA state court suit had been running parallel and ended up successful - at least at the highest levels of the PA court system. So now we will see if it holds and if the SCOTUS will refuse to hear any requests for a stay (or other action) since PA's ruling was state Constitutional & state process-related.

[DeminPennswoods]

22. The state supreme court never said districts

couldn't have a partisan make up. They said districts had to comply with the provisions of the state constitution to be compact, not divide counties/municipalities, and be in close as possible in population.

If there is an appeal, all these maps are going to get scores in accordance with standard statistical models. I'm going to say the map the state supreme court adopted is going to get the best overall score.

The court could have easily drawn a map that would have given Dems more seats, but they followed the constitutional guidelines. The bottom line is Dems probably pick up 1 seat and 8 formerly "safe" GOP seats are now more competitive. The GOP will now have to campaign on their ideas and policies rather than just partisan registration. So will Dems. May the best ideas win!

[BumRushDaShow]

23. I think that could have been due to the same argument as the federal courts

regarding what is considered "gerrymandering" and when do boundaries constitute such?

So agree that by following the state Constitution, the court generated a map that appears to comply with contiguous districts and minimizing splits of counties and municipalities. But by doing so, the lines are now no longer being drawn around the smaller, majority-minority populated cities like Chester or Reading in order to dilute the influence of their majority Democratic party-registered constituents. PA-7 was the epitome of that, going though 5-6 counties to pick up votes to barely create a "swing district" that leaned GOP.

I.e., what is now the new PA-5 (which contains a part of the old PA-7) would definitely be a seat pickup. The new PA-4 was originally split all over the place but would most likely follow the old PA-13 and remain (D). The new PA-2 & PA-3 will remain (D). PA-1 will pretty much remain swing although if lower Bucks can get a higher turnout, it could flip to (D). If the new PA-6 includes Reading, that would be more swing too. The new PA-7 appears to contain Allentown/Bethlehem & Easton and could definitely go (D). The new PA-8 looks to be part PA-17 (which is (D)) and PA-10 (which is R), but with what appears to be Wilkes-Barre/Scranton in there, it could be swing.

Just have to make sure we capture Ds as registrants in all of these districts and have some good GOTV!

[DeminPennswoods]

15. If you're a PA voter, do you like your new CD?

I like the new 17th CD.

I am in the revised 17th CD (old 12th CD). The way the CD is currently configured, my Dem vote counts for little outside of statewide elections. Although Erin McClelland gave it a couple of good goes, the new district should attract more candidates and certainly up our ability to hold Rothfus accountable.

It will be nice for me finally to have a relevent vote.

[durablend]

19. Just look at Pennlive's forum for the reactions

As expected, "impeach" and "overreach" are the prevailing themes

[DeminPennswoods]

21. Are they all Scott Wagner's toadies?

just askin'...

[DeminPennswoods]

27. Interactive map of new CDs

Here's an overlay of the new map using Google maps: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?hl=en&mid=1ISC9QQvcWdFlOUMJoMeaSEWq-Yg&ll=40.649910339679096,-78.62365843359379&z=8

Also, article from politicspa: http://www.politicspa.com/state-supreme-court-releases-congressional-maps/86511/

[DeminPennswoods]

32. Regarding the inevitable GOP appeal to federal court

A commentor over at talkingpointsmemo.com posted about a relatively recent USSC decision in an AZ case where voters approved a ballot measure taking away their legislature's ability to redistrict and giving it to an independent commission. The USSC sided with the voters by a 5-4 majority. The minority was Scalia, Thomas, Roberts and Alito. All the justices except Scalia remain so even with Gorsuch, the partisan split will remain the same (Gorsuch=Scalia), unless Kennedy changes his mind.

This is relevent because the PA GOP will argue that the state supreme court usurped the legislature's power to draw maps. The USSC ruling implies that another entity (voters) can take away legislative responsibility. That and the fact that the Rs had plenty of time to develop a map in consultation with their own members, Dems and the governor, didn't, then produced a map on deadline day shows they had the time and ability to meet the court's deadline.

[BumRushDaShow]

33. I think the fact that the GOP made a decision to throw a Hail Mary map

before the clock ran out and ignored Wolf's very public suggestion that he would accept a "shell bill" that could have contained that map, is what might hurt their case.

On the PennLive comments, the case Growe v. Emison was cited too (from 1993).

Another similar event happened in Florida in 2015 - http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article47576450.html

[sofa king]

34. Do I have this right?

If the court issued its own map, that almost automatically means that it has already found either malevolent intent on the part of the GOP to preserve their advantage, or an incompetence and inability to do their job. Either way the court must have concluded that they needed to perform direct intercession.

If that's correct, the whole case seems to be a rather clever psychological move to effect positive change, because higher courts will also be interested in preserving that unusual--but not at all unprecedented*--capability.


* One vaguely similar example of direct, executive-like intervention that I can recall comes from the treaty fishing rights cases from Washington State, where then-AG Slade Gorton was trying to kill off Indian fishing rights so that his fish-stick empire could move in. The Supreme Court told him to lay off and threatened to call in armed forces to enforce their decision, if necessary.

[DeminPennswoods]

36. Kind of

This map has been ruled unconstitutional at least once before, but because the GOP controlled all 3 branches of state gov't, it was never changed owing to the legislature having authority in drawing the map and a GOP gov who wasn't going to veto their map bill.

This time the Court again ruled the map unconstitutional and ordered a new map be done in time for the May primaries. The difference is this time we have a Dem gov, so the GOP wasn't going to get away with the status quo.

The Court's deadlines were aggressive, but map drawing is much more automated than it used to be. That's proven by the Scarnati/Turzai turning in a revised map at the deadline. Gov Wolf produced his map for submission shortly after vetoing the GOP map. The Court produced its own map in a matter of a couple days. IOW, the Court gave all parties sufficient time to produce new map proposals and submit them to the Court. The state GOP legislature just refused to make a real effort to comply with the Court's order and deadlines. That's why the Court adopted its own map.

[sofa king]

39. Thank you so much for your explanation!

That really helps me, and I am sure others, a lot!

[DeminPennswoods]

40. More info over at the Pennsylvania Group forum

I linked to the previous court case and order there.

[DeminPennswoods]

37. Dave Wasserman of Cook Political Report

who follows Congressional House races was on MTP Daily this afternoon. FWIW, he said he thinks because the USSC refused to get involved when the state Rs appealed to them, that the USSC won't get involved now.

In any event, the questions before the USSC is how to define an unconstitutional gerrymander. While the new PA map did remove some GOP advantage, it comports with state law and the state supreme court did not say districts couldn't be partisan.

[BumRushDaShow]

38. I think in PA's case

the fact that there was a parallel case in federal court to address the gerrymandering and throw the current map out, and that case was lost by the plaintiffs, means that for PA, gerrymandering was not the strongest subject to argue.

Looking back at that decision suggests what the SCOTUS might do with any GOP request -

<...>

In the case, a group of about 20 Pennsylvania voters from around the state claimed lawmakers intentionally rigged the map to favor Republicans over Democrats in an effort they believe violated the U.S. Constitution. Their argument hinged on a novel interpretation of the Elections Clause, which grants state legislatures the power to set rules regarding the time, place, and manner of congressional elections.

Attorneys for the plaintiffs argued that the clause limits state government, though, to procedural rules, and prevents it from interfering with or manipulating election outcomes.

The court disagreed with the plaintiffs’ legal theory, and said that it’s the courts that should not interfere.

“When federal courts step in, however, they do so at the risk of muddying the waters — potentially providing state legislatures with enough cover to argue that their hands are tied by the courts and that they are not responsible for a controversial map,” wrote Smith.

https://whyy.org/articles/federal-judges-uphold-pennsylvanias-congressional-map-gerrymandering-case/

So probably the best argument has been that the boundaries were not complying with the state Constitution's criteria.