How Republicans held the House: It’s the gerrymander, stupid

https://www.salon.com/2024/12/01/how-held-the-house-its-the-gerrymander-stupid/

9 comments

  1. It is not accurate to say that Republicans held the House as a result of it without making some really nitpicking claims that avoid or obscure the fact that Republicans gained just about the proportional number of seats as the popular vote would suggest. There was a tiny Democratic advantage. Same thing happened in 2022. But this does not justify nor minimize the antidemocratic reality of such gerrymandering:

    In 2024 and 2022, two very close elections, Democrats slightly outperformed seats over the popular vote.

    In 2020 and 2018, Democrats under performed seats compared to the popular vote despite winning.

    In 2016 and 2014, Democrats substantially under performed seats compared to the popular vote.

    In 2012 and 1996, Democrats literally won the popular vote but did not win the House majority.

    In other in-between years, generally Democrats under performed the popular vote.

    It should also be noted that five Republicans on the Supreme Court recent voted to keep ‘extreme partisan gerrymandering’ while the four Democrats voted against it.

  2. If we had a real Supreme Court, all this gerrymandering wouldn’t be tolerated.

  4. They won the house popular vote same as Trump won the popular vote. More Americans just wanted Republicans this year.

  6. Democrats were welcome to gerrymander when they controlled state governments. But the high road was a better option for them at the time.

    Beyond that, it’s becoming a lame whine given that voters are giving the GOP majorities just about everywhere.

  7. It is imperative, is an obligation that all blue states need to gerrymander according to the efficiency gap.

    Gerrymandering, according to the efficiency gap, will see blue states gerrymander to counter and compensate republican gerrymandering elsewhere.

    This is needed because gerrymandering is not democratic, is autocratic.

    You can’t outvote gerrymandering. That means dozens or more GOP seats are elected with ZERO votes in federal and states races if you count proportionally.

    Example: Check the NC state house how egregious this is. The GOP got a supermajority with only 47.5% of the popular vote, but that got them 57.25% of the seats. They don’t have any legitimacy.

    Democrats won 51.21% of the popular vote but only got 42.19% of the seats. This is the actual stealing of your representation.

    This has to be done in federal and state races.

  8. Pretty sure Michigan generally moved to the right and we have an independent commission that decides the districts. It was a point of contention since 2016 and it seems in general the American people bought what the Republicans were selling scam or not.

  9. It’s not. It’s the fact that the House has been capped and is not proportional to the population. That was a conservative usurpation of power that has shaped the 20th and 21st centuries.

    The foundational compromise was that each state would have equal representation in the Senate and each person (for a given definition of “person,” which has since been rectified) would have equal representation in the House. That’s simply not the case anymore, and hasn’t been since 1929.

    If the house has equal representation based on population, gerrymandering would still be a powerful tool but it wouldn’t be nearly as powerful. The electoral college would be less skewed towards rural areas.

    https://apportionment.us/Ladewig&Jasinski.pdf

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