Texas: Will Census delay make the redistricing battle worse?

If a special session for redistricting can't be done until fall, will that make Rethuglicans in the Lege, especially Danny Goeb on the Senate side, less, or more confrontational with Democraps? That said, within the GOP caucus in both houses, will it lessen or increase confrontation between rural and urban Legiscritters? As I've blogged before, the continued stagnancy, even decline, in rural Texas population, especially out in whiter and more wingnut West Texas, will make this an issue. And, how much will Trump lovers among the wingnuts admit that Der Grüppenführer was part of the problem?

• Rural vs suburban Rethugs. This here is definitely going to be interesting, especially on the state Senate side, where some suburban districts with narrow margins will have to stretch more and more out into that declining ruraldom. Likely solution vis-a-vis Democratic complaints will be increased gerrymandering defended on the charge that SCOTUS allows it for incumbency. On the House side, it will be different. It's going to be rural districts cannibalizing each other. Per my linked post, I wonder how much this influenced Drew Springer's decision to jump into the Senate seat Pat Fallon abandoned?

• Trumper vs never-Trumper Rethugs. This could play out on the House side with rural districts that are exurban more than really, really rural. Seats like Drew's former HD 68 or King's. My guess is 15 percent of the House could truly be called "remnant Joe Strausers," 45 percent "semi-wingnuts" to just "plain old wingnuts" and 40 percent "wingnuts deluxe."

• Democraps worried about not always getting out the Hispanic vote "vs" Democraps worried about more of the Hispanic vote drifting Rethuglican again. Dems may show relatively little concern for Valley House districts, especially if they're led by ConservaDems.

• Third-party voters wishing Texas adopted ranked choice voting (or proportional representation!) vs both Democraps and Rethuglicans. (But, squeezed out of the process.)

Getcha popcorn! To the degree rural vs suburban is separate from the Trumper issue, I think there's going to be some surprise dogfights. A number of rurales in the House have a number of years of experience.

Redistricting will hit West Texas Congresscritters hard

The map above, plus the so-called Texodus, tell the details.

Mac Thornberry, in the 13th (blue in the Panhandle) since 1995, Mike Conaway, in the 11th (red in west central Texas) more than a decade, and marginal Republican winner Will Hurd in the 23rd (purple in the southwest), are all leaving.

The 13th is rated as the most GOP-friendly seat in the nation and the 11th isn't far behind. The 23rd is a marginal seat, but many of its Hispanic voters have backed ConservaDems in primaries before, so a Democratic pickup might mean something in the aisles but not a lot in reality.

The fact is that West Texas' rural counties continue to, at best, grow more slowly than national averages and in many cases decline. Even the cities of above 75,000 or so — in size, from large to small, El Paso, Lubbock, Amarillo, Midland, Odessa, Wichita Falls and San Angelo —have not always grown quickly. The last two, with "old" oil and no new surge, have been nearly flat in population themselves.

Redistricting will be affected in part by whether or not the GOP holds on to the state House. If it does, then the new 23rd, if won by a Dem, will be even more gerrymandered than now. If the Democrats win, they'll try to protect that seat while putting it on the back burner of increasing their power in Austin-area districts, reversing old GOP gerrymandering there.

The 13th and 21st will interact with the 19th, 21st and 25th districts.

The 21st bears watching like the 23rd, as it is currently held by first-term Republican Chip Roy. Roy, a bigger nutbar than his predecessor, Lamar Smith, is in Democratic crosshairs for 2020. If he loses, the future shape of that district also depends on who controls the Texas House.

Jody Arrington in the 19th (orange between the 11th and 13th) is in his second term, and in a very safe district like the 11th.

Roger Williams in the 25th (gray in center) could be the big loser no matter what. He's older, is not a true Tea Party favorite, and lives in a very gerrymandered district. If Dems get the state House, their version of redistricting takes away the Austin tail of his district. The Fort Worth head probably gets put into part of a new Metroplex district, especially if you take southeastern Tarrant County out of the 6th District which makes a lot of sense. AND... current officeholder is GOP rookie Ron Wright, who replaced he retired-in-disgrace Smokey Joe Barton. Again, the future here depends on who controls the state House. Most counties in between would be added to the 11th; Hill County might get put in the 17th.

Is there any chance that the western portions of the 13th and 19th would be combined into an Amarillo-Lubbock district? Little, IMO, if the GOP holds on to the state House; if Dems take control, they're going to want to cram non-El Paso cities in West Texas into as few of districts as possible.

Stay tuned.

Arizona (and California and Iowa) meet Citizens United II

The Supreme Cour's Obamacare case is important enough (though I bet the Chief, John Roberts, makes sure that Obama wins on this one). Hype aside from Slate, I don't think it's that poorly understood.

Perhaps even bigger (and less understood on its potential ramifications) is the case where Arizona's nonpartisan commission for redistricting after Censuses is being sued by its own state legislature, an earlier version of which created said commission.

It's just Arizona on the surface, but, really, this is Iowa, California and every other state with such a commission. As the New York Times explains in detail, both Anthony Kennedy and Antonin Scalia, at least, seemed determined to take a very narrow view of one sentence in the Constitution about electing Members of Congress to gut such commissions everywhere:

The case, Arizona State Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, No. 13-1314, will turn on the meaning of a single word: “legislature.” The Constitution says that “the Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof.”

Gut nonpartisan redistricting commissions, and post-Citizens United Koch money floods states even more than now, in the last election before redistricting, especially if that's a non-presidential election year.

Look at 2010. Obamacare was unpopular, in part because of Dear Leader's lame job of selling both it and his stimulus package. It was an off-term election. The GOP killed Democrats in state legislature and gubernatorial elections, then redistricted like hell.

Where it could.

Eight states, including the three above, have some sort of redistricting structure for both U.S. and state elected positions that is not the state legislature. Swing states Colorado, Missouri, Ohio, and Pennsylvania are among them.

Now is it a bit more clear how big of a deal this could be?

Judd Gregg, the Democratic Congress, and the 2010 Census

In addition to not being a fan of the Commerce Department in the past, President Obama’s Commerce Secretary nominee, New Hampshire Sen. Judd Gregg, wasn’t a fan of spending a lot of money on the 2000 Census.

Especially given than Census undercounts tend to favor the GOP, The New York Times editorializes about whether or not Obama has thought through all the political ramifications of the Gregg nomination.

Good example. Texas is expected to gain as many as three House seats.

What if undercounts cost the D/FW Metroplex, or Houston, a seat, and a Democratic one at that?

Aha. In response to complaints from black and Hispanic leaders, the Obama Administration is pulling the 2010 Census out from Commerce control.

It’s a good political solution but a stupid bureaucratic solution, as Team Obama continues to make ad hoc decisions, often forced on it by failure to fully do original homework.

And, it’s another think, like Obama’s “czars,” that muddies bureaucratic lines of control.

Texas to gain three House seats

Texas should gain three House seats after the 2010 Census, according to Election Data Services. Arizona, Utah, Nevada and Florida will be among other gainers, with one seat each. Great Lakes-bordering New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan are each expected to lose one seat, among various states, with Ohio possibly losing two and Illinois maybe losing one; nobody else, other than the Ohio possibility, will lose more than one.

In other tidbits, Arizona has passed Washington, Indiana, Massachusetts and other states this decade to move into the Top 15.

And, will somebody wake up out there? And Utah and Nevada? There's a 50-50 chance Lake Mead disappears within 15 years due to long-term drought and global warming. There goes drinking water, agricultural water and development water, not to mention Hoover Dam hydroelectricity, all gone and no longer available for those three states. (Southwestern Utah is already pushing the nutbar idea of piping water from Lake Powell, even as that reservoir also continues to diminish.)

And, per Politico, population mobility has dropped this decade, compared to the past few. With Peak Oil and other issues, that trend may well continue into the next decade.