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Divided We Stand

Divided We Stand
New book about the 2020 election.

Friday, March 7, 2025

Federal Employees and Congressional Constituencies

Our forthcoming book is The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American PoliticsIt includes a chapter on congressional and state elections.

Justin Green at Axios:

Republicans represent a slight majority of the 60 congressional districts with the highest share of federal workers, including many lawmakers publicly cheering on Elon Musk's hack-and-slash efforts.

Why it matters: At first glance, it seems like DOGE's stabs at slashing the federal workforce mainly affect the solidly Democratic areas in the D.C. metro area.

  • But dig a little deeper, and the story changes.
  • Speaker Johnson (R-La.) is on the list. So is Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), who leads the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus, and Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), the chair of the House Appropriations Committee.
  • Several endangered GOP incumbents — including Reps. Jen Kiggans (R-Va.) and Juan Ciscomani (R-Ariz.) — are on that list.

By the numbers: According to a Congressional Research Service report published in December, nearly all of the 10 districts with the highest proportions of federal workers are in Washington, D.C., Virginia and Maryland.

  • D.C. is essentially a company town where the factory is the vast federal government bureaucracy, as Axios' Cuneyt Dil recently noted. Many of its workers live in D.C.'s surrounding suburbs and exurbs.
  • Once you get past the top 10 districts, red states like Oklahoma, Alabama and Texas start to show up.

Zoom in: Beyond D.C., the Defense Department — which isn't being spared DOGE's wrath — accounts for high concentrations in some districts.

  • Kiggans and Cole represent districts with large military installations that have long been major employers for their constituents.
  • Rep. Nick Begich (R-Alaska), who is in a competitive district, has a large military constituency. But agencies like the Interior Department, FAA and Postal Service also have significant presences, according to the Anchorage Daily News.