| Democrats argue their gerrymander in Virginia produces “fairness” because of Republicans’ own gerrymandering efforts in places like Texas, where the GOP is likely to pick up five new congressional seats under a new map.
Most states redraw congressional maps every 10 years. President Donald Trump has aggressively lobbied Republican states to redistrict mid-cycle in an effort to hold onto the GOP’s narrow House majority.
Like Virginia, California voters passed a ballot initiative last year scrapping the map produced by that state’s redistricting commission in favor of a new map that creates another five Democratic-leaning districts.
Both the Texas and California maps have survived court challenges for the moment.
Following the Virginia vote, Democrats will likely net one seat from the pre-midterm back-and-forth gerrymanders, according to NPR’s tally. That advantage might tip to Republicans should Florida follow through on a redistricting plan.
Gerrymandering is not a new phenomenon. Read Reason‘s Eric Boehm’s 2018 deep dive on how bad the practice had gotten then and what can be done to fix it.
Per Boehm’s article, the technical fixes to prevent partisan gerrymandering are not that complicated. States could use computers to create contiguous, compact maps that don’t “pack” and “crack” voters into animal-shaped districts for partisan advantage.
The real obstacle to fixing gerrymandering, as this year’s redistricting efforts show, is political. Ultimately, lawmakers and voters will decide what system their state will use to draw legislative districts. In one cycle, they might opt for a fairer map drawn by an independent commission. When partisan emotions are running high (like this year), they might scrap those systems in the desperate search for partisan advantage.
Solutions like nationalizing election rules or turning it all over to the courts seem suboptimal for anyone who values federalism.
Hopefully, if the two parties continue to gerrymander in equal proportions, at least there will be some meta-fairness to all the new lobster maps being created.
Anti-hate group charged with fraud for funding hate groups. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) used fake entities to pay members of hate groups millions of dollars to act as informants, alleges the Department of Justice (DOJ) in a new indictment.
“The SPLC is manufacturing racism to justify its existence,” said Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche in a press release. “Using donor money to allegedly profit off Klansmen cannot go unchecked.”
According to the DOJ, the SPLC paid $3 million from 2014 to 2023 to members of racist and neo-Nazi groups it was surveilling as part of its cataloging of hate groups. One member of the neo-Nazi National Alliance was paid $1,000,000 over that period. Another informant, who is described as an organizer of the infamous Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, was paid $270,000 over that period.
The DOJ’s 11-count indictment alleges that these payments to informants, which were often made via fake, unincorporated groups, violate various federal wire fraud and money laundering laws.
The SPLC’s interim chief executive, Bryan Fair, described the DOJ’s accusations as false and politically motivated.
Scenes from Washington, D.C.: One can hardly believe their eyes. The long dry fountains in D.C.’s Meridian Hill Park are once again flowing, following restoration efforts by the National Park Service. |
