Election News

Note that the March 13th special election in the vacant 18th district will take place within the old boundaries. That race, in a district Donald Trump won by 20 points in 2016, was moved to toss-up this week by The Cook Political Report. The old 18th is now largely the new 14th district, which is even more Republican-leaning. The Sabato article discusses the implications for this race on November. The main takeaway is that if the Democrat Conor Lamb wins, his best bet to stay in Congress is to run in the 17th district against Republican Keith Rothfus.

The new Pennsylvania borders could also prove to be critical in who controls the House after the midterms. Looking at the entire country, Republicans currently control 238 seats, 20 more than the 218 required when there are no vacancies. (There are currently four opens seats, including the aforementioned one in Pennsylvania). The latest projection for November has Republicans at least slightly favored in exactly 218 seats, the lowest it has been this entire cycle.  

The suits do not challenge the use of the Electoral College system - which is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution - but instead that winner-take-all disenfranchises many voters. The ultimate goal of the plaintiffs is to establish an allocation of electoral votes proportional to the popular vote across the 48 states that today use winner-take-all. Nebraska and Maine use a different method that partially allocates electoral votes by congressional district.

The plaintiffs vary by state, but include the League of United Latin American Citizens and former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld. The legal team is led by David Boies, who represented then Vice-President Al Gore in the Bush v. Gore case that resolved the disputed 2000 presidential election. In that election, as in 2016, the Democratic nominee lost the election - by falling short of 270 electoral votes - despite winning the popular vote.

This isn't the first effort to modify winner-take-all. Several state legislatures have introduced their own proposals over the years. These are almost always partisan efforts, occuring when the party controlling the legislature is not the one winning in presidential races. In our Gaming the Electoral College feature, we look at the impact of various methodologies that have been proposed.

Here's the current map (with incumbent party)

The 'instant punditry' on Twitter is that the new map is quite favorable for the Democrats, although we haven't seen any specific district-by-district analysis as of yet. Republicans will almost certainly challenge the ruling.

The full ruling, along with dissenting opinions can be found here.

Including individual maps drawn by the Legislature and Governor, seven proposals were submitted for consideration. The Court could choose one of those or create one of its own. It has retained a redistricting expert to assist in the process.

A few notes:

• The March 13 special election for the vacant 18th district will take place using the current borders
• The new districts will be effective for voting beginning with the primaries, scheduled for May 15
  • However, the borders will not change for representation purposes until the next Congress (January, 2019)
• While Pennsylvania is roughly a 50/50 state, Democrats are heavily concentrated in Philadelphia and, to a lesser extent, Pittsburgh. Given other geographic and political factors involved (e.g., contiguous area, keeping counties/towns together wherever possible), it is likely that the new map will still favor Republicans in more districts than Democrats.
• Assuming no further litigation, the new map will be effective for the 2018 and 2020 elections. After the 2020 Census, most states will engage in a redistricting process that will be effective with the 2022 elections.

A Facebook page 'Kevin Cramer for US Senate' posted that the announcement would come late Friday afternoon in Bismarck.

Cramer will become the 51st current House member to pass on re-election to that body in 2018. He'll be the 10th of those running for the U.S. Senate.  We'll add him to the list of retirements when the announcement is official.

Kramer won his third term in 2016 by 45%, while Donald Trump won the state by 36%. This is Heitkamp's first term; she won election in 2012 by just under 1%. 

While the revised map meet some of the Court's specifications regarding geographic compactness and political (e.g., county and/or city) boundaries, numerous analyses have found the submitted map to be roughly as partisan as the current map. 

Current Map, seats held by party (from our Interactive House Map, choose Pennsylvania in the drop down):

Proposed Map (from the Washington Post, based on presidential margin of victory in 2016):

The Court order specified that the new borders will be effective for the 2018 midterms, beginning with the state's primaries, scheduled for May 15th. However, the special election for the vacant 18th district, scheduled for March 13th, will take place under the existing boundaries.

Five of Minnesota's eight districts are expected to be at least somewhat competitive in 2018. No states with more districts has this high a percentage of competitive races.

* Of the 12 districts, only the adjacent 7th district went more heavily for Trump that year. He won by 31% there. The long-time Democratic incumbent, Collin Peterson, won a 14th term by 5%.

The last time a presidential election occurred on November 3rd was in 1992, when Democrat Bill Clinton defeated incumbent Republican George H.W. Bush.

Brady, in his 11th term, has been shadowed by an FBI investigation into a payment his campaign made to a primary opponent in 2012. Brady was not charged, but a political consultant for the congressman pleaded guilty to lying about the payment. He represents Pennsylvania's 1st district, which is one of the most Democratic in the country. Both Brady and Clinton won here by more than 60 points in 2016. The district primarily runs along the Delaware River from Northeast Philadelphia to Chester. It will likely be redrawn if a recent court ruling is upheld.

Brady is the 5th announced departure among the state's 17 current members. Pennsylvania's 18th district is vacant, and will be filled by a special election on March 13th. Gowdy is the first 2018 retirement from South Carolina's congressional delegation.

Texas appears to be the biggest surprise; Trump's approval here was just 39%. A couple caveats to keep in mind: the surveys were taken over the course of an entire year, so not really a snapshot in time. Also, the surveys were of adults; no consideration given to voter registration status. That last point might help explain the low number in Texas, as Latinos have historically voted at lower rates than whites.

The above in mind, it probably isn't totally fair to try and translate approval ratings into a 2020 electoral map. Of course, if one published a website around electoral maps, they might do it anyway.  So here it is. The map is interactive, so if you don't agree with our categorizations (below the map), you can change them and create your own.

Click the map to create your own at 270toWin.com

• All states with Trump at 50% or higher shown as red.
• All states, except Texas, with Trump below 40% shown as Democratic. As it turns out, this is all the states Clinton won in 2016 except for Maine, New Hampshire and Nevada.
• Texas is shown as undecided/toss-up based on the above discussion.
• All states in the 40-49% range are shown as undecided/toss-up unless Clinton or Trump won it by more than 10% in 2016. There are eight states won by Trump that fit in this category; they are shown as pink in the map.
• District information is not provided for Maine or Nebraska, so the map ignores any split possibilities.