Democratic Challenges

Our next book is tentatively titled The Comeback: The 2024 Elections and American Politics.   Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections.

John Haskell:

There are more red states than blue by a margin of 24-19. And as partisan lines have hardened this century we have now reached the point where Democrats have exactly zero senators from these states. The last of them had a tough time surviving — a seemingly impossible one in West Virginia that Joe Manchin managed, and improbable success in Montana for Tester and Ohio for Brown. Alas, Manchin stepped side in 2024 and other two were defeated.

The red state Senate Democrat can now be reclassified from an endangered species to an extinct one.

Even if the party gets every single blue seat (they have all but the one seat in Maine stubbornly held onto by Susan Collins), they start at a severe disadvantage. The balance of power in the Senate rides on the seven purple states. Democrats do very well there, with 10 of the 14 seats, but even that is not enough, with Republicans now holding a 53-47 overall edge. Democrats’ prospects of turning that around are vanishingly slim. More likely is that Republicans gradually begin to even the score in the purple states, adding to their advantage.

As for the House, we’ll know a lot more after the 2026 midterms. At this point the body is on a knife’s edge with 220 likely GOP seats to 215 for the Democrats once all is said and done. But Democrats hold far more Trump district seats (14) than Republicans have Harris district seats (3).

While the situation in the House is not as clear cut as it is in the Senate, it too doesn’t look promising for Democrats. It’s worthwhile to be reminded that the states that stand to gain the most seats after the 2030 census are governed by Republicans who have access to those computer programs that facilitate gerrymandering. What states will losing seats? You guessed it, they’re mostly blue. Add it up: a net gain for Republicans beginning in 2032.

What we’re starting to see is a mirror image of the 1954-1994 period where the House was solidly in Democratic hands and the Senate was usually but not always also Democratic. Today it’s a solid Republican Senate with John Thune of South Dakota headed for a long run as Majority Leader and Chuck Schumer having to make himself comfortable in the minority leader’s office space. In the House, a majority is within reach for Democrats, but maybe not for long.

Incumbents Losing Primaries

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections. 

The number of House incumbents who lose primaries tends to be higher in the first election after reapportionment and redistricting.  Many have substantially new constituencies, and some face other incumbents.

Andrew Solender at Axios:

The 2022 midterms are on track to see the most losses by House members in their primaries in three decades.

Why it matters: The number of incumbents who have been ousted — or are likely to be toppled in upcoming primary contests — highlights a political realignment that has been underway in both parties for years.This year's primary bloodbath follows 2020's, which saw the most primary losses in a non-redistricting year since 1974.

State of play: 11 House members have lost their primaries so far this cycle — seven Republicans and four Democrats. Several common trends have emerged: 

• Incumbent vs. incumbent: 10 House members were forced to compete with a colleague for a district after their state lost a seat in reapportionment.
• Progressive vs. moderate: Progressive Reps. Andy Levin (D-Mich.) and Marie Newman (D-Ill.) lost to more moderate colleagues, while centrist Rep. Kurt Schrader (D-Ore.) lost to a liberal primary challenger.
• Trump's revenge: In five cases, former President Trump's endorsement helped topple incumbents who broke with him on impeachment or, in other cases, major legislation.
• Ethics issues: Reps. Steven Palazzo (R-Miss.) and Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.) lost to insurgents amid ethics controversies, with Cawthorn in particular engulfed in a cloud of scandal. 

Douglas Kronaizl at Ballotpedia News:

 So far this year, 182 state legislative incumbents—48 Democrats and 134 Republicans—have lost to primary challengers.

Across the 38 states that have held primaries, 4.6% of incumbents running for re-election have lost, an elevated level of incumbent losses compared to previous cycles.

 

Census Miscounts

 Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections.  The 2020 campaign unfolded amid a decennial census.

Texas and Florida did not devote enough money to encouraging people to fill out their forms.

Big mistake.

Hansi Lo Wang at NPR:

For the 2020 census, all states were not counted equally well for population numbers used to allocate political representation and federal funding over the next decade, according to a U.S. Census Bureau report released Thursday.

A follow-up survey the bureau conducted to measure the national tally's accuracy found significant net undercount rates in six states: Arkansas (5.04%), Florida (3.48%), Illinois (1.97%), Mississippi (4.11%), Tennessee (4.78%) and Texas (1.92%).

It also uncovered significant net overcount rates in eight states — Delaware (5.45%), Hawaii (6.79%), Massachusetts (2.24%), Minnesota (3.84%), New York (3.44%), Ohio (1.49%), Rhode Island (5.05%) and Utah (2.59%).

For the other 36 states, as well as Washington, D.C., the bureau did not find statistically significant net over- or undercount rates.

Mike Schneider at AP:

Florida's undercount translates into around 750,600 missed residents, and an analysis by Election Data Services shows the Sunshine State needed only around 171,500 more residents to gain an extra seat. The undercount in Texas translates into around 560,000 residents, while the Election Data Services analysis put Texas as needing only 189,000 more residents to gain another congressional seat. Hispanics make up more than a quarter of Florida's population and almost 40% of Texas residents, and critics say the Trump administration's failed efforts to add a citizenship question to the census form may have had a chilling effect on the participation of Hispanics, immigrants and others. It was a different story for states where residents were overcounted, like Minnesota and Rhode Island. Minnesota was allocated the 435th and final congressional seat in the House of Representatives; if Minnesota had counted 26 fewer people, that seat would have gone to New York. Minnesota's 3.8% overcount amounted to around 219,000 residents.

 

Reapportionment: Advantage R, But Limited

Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections.

Before the census, it looked as if there would be a massive seat shift favoring Republicans. Sean Trende at RealClearPolitics:

Instead, the reapportionment numbers announced by the US Census Bureau on Monday were something of a wash. Only seven states lost seats while six gained seats.

There were notable outcomes here: California lost a seat for the first time in its history. Rhode Island – widely expected to be reduced to a single-member state – held onto its two House seats (in fact it wasn’t a terribly close shave). New York, even with COVID-19 deaths pushing it toward a loss of two seats, lost just one.

...

Even the quiet nature of this reapportionment was historic. The 14 total seats that will be reshuffled is the smallest number in the history of reapportionments. This is true even with newly admitted states excluded, as well as accounting for the growing size of the House during the 1800s.

What will this mean for redistricting? In November of last year I estimated that Republicans would probably gain six seats from a normal redistricting. In other words, without doing anything like trying to squeeze a 13-2 map out of Ohio (which is doable) or break apart Emanuel Cleaver’s Kansas City-based district in Missouri (again, doable), Democrats would lose control of the House

...

 So Democrats likely will gain two seats net over their previous baseline, meaning that Republicans won’t be in a position to take the House simply through a “natural” redistricting. Of course, there is still some wiggle room here as there are cascading effects from these changes. As noted above, some of Arizona’s Democratic-leaning districts that likely would have become safe as a result of gaining a seat will likely have to take on some Republican-leaning territory and will be more marginal. There may be similar effects in Florida and especially Texas. Regardless, this is good news for Democrats in their quest to hold the House.

 

Reapportionment: Advantage R

 Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics.  Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections.

 Chris Matthews at MarketWatch:

The Census Bureau released the preliminary findings of its 2020 U.S. population count on Monday, setting the stage for a once-in-a-decade congressional redistricting process that could in itself be enough to give the Republican Party the five additional House seats needed to recapture the majority following the 2022 midterm elections.

Under the new count, California, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia will each lose a congressional seat. Colorado, Florida, Montana, North Carolina, Oregon and Florida will gain one seat, while Texas will add two.

“New census data and reapportionment add challenges for the Democrats in the midterm elections,” wrote Sarah Bianchi, political analyst at Evercore ISI, in a Tuesday note to clients, pointing out that states that President Joe Biden won in the 2020 election lost a net three congressional seats.

“The outcome was not as bad for Democrats as some thought it would be, and there is a long way to go in terms of mapping congressional districts for 2022. However there is no question that on balance it favors Republicans,” Bianchi added. “Based on historical odds, Democrats already face challenges to keep the House in 2022 as the party that holds the White House on average loses 27 seats, far greater than the slim majority Democrats hold today.”

Maloney to Lead DCCC

In Defying the Odds, we discuss state and congressional elections as well as the presidential race.   Our next book, title TBA, discusses the 2020 results.

Some Democrats think that the controversy over "defunding" the police -- and other aspects of big-city progressivism -- cost their party seats in the 2020 congressional elections

Bridget Bowman at Roll Call:

House Democrats have chosen New York Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney to lead their campaign arm in 2022, and Maloney has his work cut out for him.

Maloney defeated California Rep. Tony Cárdenas in the race to chair the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, leveraging his knowledge of the committee’s inner workings and his own experience running in a competitive district. The caucus vote was 119-107.

Democrats enter the 117th Congress with their smallest majority in more than a century and face a difficult election cycle in 2022, since the president’s party typically loses House seats in midterm elections.

House districts will also be redrawn across the country to reflect population changes in the 2020 Census, and a Democratic effort to capture control of state legislatures that would control that process came up empty in November..

...
Maloney will succeed the outgoing DCCC chairwoman, Illinois Rep. Cheri Bustos, who almost lost her own race after Democrats faced disappointments in races across the country. Instead of adding to their House majority, it’s shrunk to single digits, and Democrats did not defeat a single House GOP incumbent.

Sarah Ferris and Ally Mutnick at Politico:

Cárdenas was vocal about reforming some of DCCC’s practices, including ending a contentious policy that banned the organization from hiring any consultant that has helped a primary challenger of a sitting Democrat — a practice that enraged progressives.

Maloney has acknowledged concerns with messaging and said he would reconsider the DCCC blacklist, though he has been mostly restrained — both publicly and privately — in his assessment of DCCC’s miscalculations.

“The smart thing for the DCCC chair to do is to say, I don't know what happened until I’ve really had a chance to dig into the numbers,” Maloney said in a recent interview.

As chair, Maloney will have an additional task of shepherding members through the decennial redistricting process, which is fraught with politics and internal bickering, particularly in states that are on track to lose a seat. Adding to the uncertainty is the fact that the Census Bureau will almost certainly not be able to release its reapportionment data in December, delaying states ability to draw new maps.

It’s entirely possible that redistricting alone creates enough red-friendly seats to place Republicans in the majority in 2022. The GOP has total control of the process in many key states, including Texas, Florida and North Carolina, which could have a combined total of 82 seats.

Alex Rogers at CNN:

When asked whether proposals from the Left -- like defunding the police and banning fracking -- hurt Democratic candidates, Maloney told CNN that the House "didn't pass a single piece of legislation that had anything to do with defunding the police" and "never pushed socialism."

"Those are caricatures that our opponents used often with great dishonesty," Maloney told CNN. "I don't plan to enhance the attack by echoing it. There are tough messages being thrown at you in every challenging election cycle. My job is not to whine about it. My job is to win."

Cárdenas campaigned on his work as chairman of the Hispanic Caucus' BOLD PAC, but the group's process to endorse California Secretary of State Alex Padilla for Vice President-elect Kamala Harris' Senate seat rubbed some members the wrong way. California Rep. Linda Sánchez, and another Hispanic Caucus member, Texas Rep. Veronica Escobar, were among those whipping Democrats to support Maloney.
"I'm supporting Sean Patrick Maloney because he has the depth of experience to remake the DCCC, and he's personally committed

 

 

Mail Ballots, Voting Rights, and the Census

In Defying the Odds, we discuss the 2016 campaign. The 2019 update includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms. The 2020 race, the subject of our next book, is well under  way.  

Top WH Econ Adviser Larry Kudlow weighs in on stimulus negotiations, says "voting rights … that's not our game.” pic.twitter.com/OkE8nWfpJC

— The Recount (@therecount) August 13, 2020

Chuck Todd, Carrie Dann, Ben Kamisar and Melissa Holzberg at NBC:

• Trump installed a new Postmaster General (who was a campaign donor) who instituted new cost-saving measures that have slowed mail delivery nationwide and sparked fears about absentee ballot delays.
• He explicitly said yesterday that he would block proposed emergency funding for the Postal Service, adding that USPS doesn’t “have the money to do the universal mail-in voting. So therefore, they can’t do it, I guess.
• He appeared to put more stock in an intelligence report finding that China prefers a Biden presidency than in Russian efforts to denigrate Biden, despite intelligence officials saying that pro-Trump election interference from Russia “was the far graver, and more immediate, threat.
• He equated foreign interference from Russia to Democrats “meddling” in the election because they are promoting mail-in balloting during the pandemic.
• He suggested in a tweet that Florida’s mail-in ballots are more trustworthy than other states’ because Florida has had “two great Republican governors.”
• The president’s son-in-law reportedly met in person with Kanye West, who is trying to get on ballots nationwide and recently did not deny that he’s doing so as a spoiler to Biden’s campaign.
• GOP operatives in at least four states have aided West’s attempts to get on the 2020 ballot

William H. Frey at Brookings:

Two weeks ago, the Trump administration issued a memorandum seeking to remove undocumented immigrants (“illegal aliens” in the memo’s words) from the census headcount that serves as the basis for reapportioning House of Representatives members among states. Then, on Monday, the Census Bureau announced that they would be cutting short the headcount by a month. In both cases, these changes will result in an undercount of demographic groups that are not part of Trump’s political base.

The plan to omit undocumented immigrants for congressional reapportionment falls in line with the administration’s failed proposal to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, which was struck down by the Supreme Court last year. After the ruling, Trump ordered the development of a database—using federal sources such as the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration—which could be used to identify undocumented immigrants.

Census Politics

In Defying the Odds, we discuss congressional elections as well as the presidential race.   The census, of course, shapes reapportionment and redistricting.

Aaron Blake at WP:

The Supreme Court was confronted with a difficult question in the past year. The Trump administration wanted to put a citizenship question on the 2020 Census, and its stated reason was to enforce the Voting Rights Act. But opponents argued this was, in fact, a thinly veiled partisan gambit to draw more GOP-friendly districts.

The court issued a remarkable rebuke of the Trump administration’s stated reason. And now, the Trump administration is pretty much acknowledging its motivation was precisely what its critics claimed.

President Trump on Tuesday signed a memorandum stating that undocumented immigrants should not be included as part of the next process of apportionment — i.e., the doling out of congressional districts that follows every census. Such a move would reduce the representation of states (many of them blue) with higher undocumented populations.

...

Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. strongly rebuked Ross and the administration, saying, “What was provided here [as a justification] was more of a distraction.”

Absent from the Trump administration’s legal defense was any indication that this was part of an effort geared toward apportionment or redistricting — the latter being the decennial drawing of new districts to reflect population shifts.

But it was part of the opposition’s case. Critics in the past year pointed to a previously unpublished 2015 presentation from the late GOP redistricting expert Tom Hofeller, which stated that using citizenship data in a state such as Texas “would be advantageous to Republicans and non-Hispanic whites” by diluting the influence of Democratic-leaning Hispanics. The critics argued that the Justice Department’s case for a census citizenship question closely mirrored Hofeller’s 2015 study, reinforcing the political motivations of the move.

And Trump himself seemed to affirm that aim. As the case was progressing, the president blurted out that, “Number one, you need it for Congress — you need it for Congress for districting.”

...
 Trump’s move Tuesday suggests his comments were more than just a coincidence — and that his administration’s disavowals of this alleged goal were dishonest, at best.

California Could Lose One or More House Seats

In Defying the Odds, we discuss state and congressional elections as well as the presidential race. The update looks at political and demographic trends through the 2018 midterm.

Sarah Parvini and John Myers at LAT:

California is poised to lose a congressional seat for the first time in its history as a state, based on U.S. Census Bureau population estimates released Monday that showed the nation’s growth continued to slow in 2019.

Some 27 states and the District of Columbia lost residents through net domestic migration between 2018 and 2019, the new census data show.

About 203,000 people left California in that period, a result of the state’s shifting migration patterns and economic strains that are making it harder to afford living here. New York, Illinois, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Louisiana also saw large losses to other states.

California’s potential loss in reapportionment, which will be determined by next year’s census count, would drop the state’s number of seats in the U.S. House of Representatives from 53 to 52, said William Frey, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

...

Those without reliable internet connections may be missed in a census that will rely heavily on online surveys. Los Angeles County, officials say, will be the nation’s hardest to tally because of its high concentrations of renters and homeless people, as well as immigrant communities that may not participate, either because of language barriers or because they fear being targeted by federal immigration authorities.

“If, as many fear, non-citizen populations and the state’s heavily Latino population either fails to participate or participates without providing full household counts, then California could lose more than one seat,” said [Paul] Mitchell, whose firm analyzes political data for regional and statewide candidates.

Trump Acknowledges Partisan Motivation in Census Case

In Defying the Odds, we discuss congressional elections as well as the presidential race.   The census, of course, shapes reapportionment and redistricting.  The update  -- recently published --includes a chapter on the 2018 midterms.

At WP, Aaron Blake explains how Trump may have undercut the Justice Department's legal case for a citizenship question on the census.  In a scrum with reporters, he said there were many reaons for the question.

“Number one, you need it for Congress — you need it for Congress for districting,” he said Friday. “You need it for appropriations — where are the funds going? How many people are there? Are they citizens? Are they not citizens? You need it for many reasons.”

Take note of that first one. Not only was a redistricting rationale not mentioned by the administration in its failed legal defense of the question, but it was actually something the other side argued was the administration’s true motivation. The plaintiffs in the case — and many who oppose the citizenship question — have argued that this is a thinly veiled attempt by Republicans to gain a potential game-changing tool in redistricting.

...

You can read more on this here, but suffice it to say: The U.S. Supreme Court has said congressional districts must be apportioned to the states according to total population, but it has not said those states cannot then draw those districts according to citizen voting-age population (CVAP).

This is more than hypothetical. It has been studied by some of the party’s most influential voices on redistricting. One study of how this might play out in Texas — a state with a large noncitizen population — said drawing districts using CVAP “would be advantageous to Republicans and non-Hispanic whites,” while diluting the political power of Latinos.

The 2015 study was written by the late Republican redistricting guru Thomas Hofeller. If that name sounds familiar, it’s because he’s the guy whose fingerprints appear to be on the Justice Department’s legal rationale for the census citizenship question. We learned that after Hofeller’s daughter discovered some relevant documents on his computer after his death last year.

Census: Disputed Count in CA

Seema Mehta reports in The Los Angeles Times:

California officials estimate that the U.S. Census Bureau failed to count 1.5 million of the state's residents, a discrepancy that if true could cost the state billions of dollars in federal aid over the next decade and perhaps an increase in its representation in Congress.

On Tuesday, the Census Bureau released national and state population figures that declared California to have 37.3 million residents, 10% more than in 2000. That growth — based on mailed-in surveys and door-to-door interviews by census takers — roughly mirrored the nation's, but meant that for the first time since California became a state in 1850 it did not grow enough to add another member to its congressional delegation.

But according to the state Department of Finance, the state's population was 38.8 million on July 1. That figure is drawn from birth and death statistics, school-enrollment data, driver's license address changes, tax returns and Medicare enrollment, a set of data points that provides a "more refined" picture of the population, according to H.D. Palmer, a finance department spokesman.

Census Analysis

First data from the Census are here.

At the Rose Institute, Doug Johnson writes:

The 2010 apportionment of Congressional districts among the 50 states is brings Western states’ gains to 26 Congressional seats since the 1970s, with the South picking up 27. The Northeast has now lost 26 seats and the Midwest 27 over the same period. The disparity in population growth will significantly alter the makeup of the House of Representatives. In the 1970s, the Midwest and Northeast together made up 52% of Congress. After 2010, they will hold only 40% of the seats. The Northeast alone held 104 seats in the 1970s, but that number is now down to 78.

At the Washington Examiner, Timothy Carney writes:

D.C. congressional representation was a possibility last decade, in part because of a proposed compromise that pleased Republicans: we increase the chamber from 435 seats to 437; D.C. would get one seat, and overwhelmingly Republican Utah would get another.

Now this wasn't just arbitrary, and Utah wasn't chosen just for being the most Republican state in the country. Utah spent last decade as the "First Loser" in the reapportionment lottery. The state just barely missed out on getting a fourth seat. Put another way, a fourth Utah seat was the 436th seat according to the reapportionment formula.

But Democrats blew up statehood over gun rights last Congress. Then Republicans took over the House. D.C. representation was basically dead for now, and the reapportionment makes it even more dead.

Utah got its fourth seat. The 436th seat this decade is North Carolina -- it just missed out on gaining a seat. Who knows if that seat would have been a Republican or Democratic seat? But we know this: it's not a good counterweight to a 100% liberal Democratic D.C. seat; and it's nothing like a 4th seat in Utah, the most Republican state in the country.

The New York Times reports:

On the surface, Republicans would seem to have an overwhelming advantage. Most of the states gaining seats trend Republican, and most of those losing them tend to elect Democrats. What is more, Republicans will be well-placed to steer the process, with Republican governors outnumbering Democratic ones 29 to 20, with one independent, come January.

“Republicans are in the best position since modern redistricting began,” said Tim Storey, an expert on redistricting at the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Of the 336 districts whose borders are drawn by state legislatures, Republicans have full control of 196, Mr. Storey said. Democrats control legislatures for 49; a further 91 are split. The rest would be drawn by divided legislatures or appointed commissions.

But population gains in the South and West were driven overwhelmingly by members of minorities, particularly Hispanics. The new districts will need to be drawn to reflect their numbers, opening potential advantages for Democrats.

....

In Texas, for example, more than 85 percent of the population growth has been minority, according to Kenneth Johnson, a demographer at the University of New Hampshire. And even though Republicans control every statewide elected office and both chambers of the legislature, state Republican officials concede that the district lines will most likely be drawn so Democrats are in position to win as many as two of the new seats.

The Red Shift

UPDATE: 10:42 AM PST

Aaron Blake writes at The Washington Post:

Republican-leaning states in the South and West that experienced a population boom over the past decade will gain political clout, while some historically Democratic states in the Rust Belt will lose it, according to Census Bureau figures released Tuesday aimed at ensuring proportional representation in the House.

...

The shift will change the partisan lean from blue to red of a net of six electoral college votes. Obama beat McCain by 192 electoral college votes in 2008.

Overall, 18 states lost or gained congressional districts. Texas, as expected, gained the most seats, moving from 32 to 36 seats. Florida was the only other state to gain multiple seats, adding two and bringing it to 27 seats.

Six other states gained a single seat: Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina, Utah and Washington.

The biggest losers were New York and Ohio, which each lost two seats. Eight other states lost a single seat: Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Republicans will control the redistricting process in eight of the states experiencing changes, while Democrats will control it in two.

Sean Trende adds at RealClearPolitics:

Overall, this represents a continued shift in the Electoral College from blue-leaning states to red-leaning states. If the 2008 election had been held under these census numbers, President Obama's 365-173 victory over John McCain would have become a 359-179 win. For 2004, the numbers are starker still: Bush's 286-251 victory would become a 292-246 win, meaning that even if Kerry had won Ohio, he still would have lost (in 2004, flipping Ohio would have been sufficient to give Kerry the win).

And finally, in 2000, rather than a 271-266 win (with one faithless Gore/Lieberman elector from DC abstaining), the changes of the past two decades would have resulted in a President Bush win of 285-252. While Florida would still would have been the difference-maker, Gore would not have to tell himself that, had he won New Hampshire, Tennessee or Arkansas, the whole Florida debacle would have been irrelevant.

Population and Trends in the Electoral College

The 2012 election will have a different distribution in the electoral college, and the Republicans may realize a slight benefit. The Politico reports:

"Based upon the results of the 2008 election for president but with the electoral vote for the 2012 election, the Republicans would see a slight gain under the projected apportionment of 7 votes," Polidata's Clark Bensen told POLITICO on Thursday. "Twelve of the 18 states with shifts voted for Obama in 2008 while 6 voted for McCain. Nine of the 12 Obama states would lose seats, while five of the six McCain states would gain."

• The Polidata estimates are here.
• EDS report is here.