{"id":36547,"date":"2013-05-28T21:52:52","date_gmt":"2013-05-29T03:52:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/05\/28\/the-dark-side-of-whiter-voting-districts.html"},"modified":"2013-05-29T10:19:14","modified_gmt":"2013-05-29T16:19:14","slug":"the-dark-side-of-whiter-voting-districts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/05\/28\/the-dark-side-of-whiter-voting-districts.html","title":{"rendered":"The dark side of whiter voting districts"},"content":{"rendered":"
In 2012, GOP-led statehouses overall gerrymandered districts to make their own safer, largely by shunting minorities and more liberal populations into Democratic districts, and making sure their own districts were more likely to vote Republican. \u00a0Thus, even though most of the population growth in the US since 2002 was among minority populations, the Republicans managed to end up with whiter, more conservative districts.<\/p>\n

'According to the non-partisan Cook Political Report, House Republicans today represent 6.6 million fewer minorities than in 2002 \u2014 the last time the lines were redrawn. The average GOP district is now 75% white, up 2 percentage points after the 2012 reconfiguration, while the average Democratic district is 51% white, down one percentage point since 2002.<\/i><\/p>\n

[…] Republican districts have less ideological diversity as well. Fifteen years ago, Cook rated 148 congressional seats safe for Republicans, while today there are 186 safe Republican seats, meaning 80% of Republicans face all but no threat of a general election challenge. The districts Republicans control have also become more conservative, heightening pressure to appeal to more ideological constituents. Over the past two decades, the median Republican congressional district went from being seven points more Republican than the national average to 12 points more Republican than the national average.'<\/i><\/p>\n

The main problem (well, a<\/i> problem) with all that? \u00a0Those districts tend to present more-conservative-than-thou primary challenges. Yes, even though their districts are safe for Republican<\/i> candidates, they are unsafe for Moderate<\/i> Republican candidates. Or Compromising<\/i> Republican candidates. \u00a0<\/p>\n

So\u00a0the nature of those challenges and those constituencies is such as to give sitting GOP Representatives very little interest in reaching out to anyone other than their hand-picked conservative white base, who are uninterested in (or downright hostile toward) things like immigration control … which, ironically, the GOP leadership considers a priority item in order to garner more Hispanic support for future presidential elections. \u00a0<\/p>\n

(h\/t +<\/span>George Wiman<\/a><\/span>)<\/p>\n

Reshared post from +Robert Miletich<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n

\n

\n \n <\/div>\n

GOP districts have become whiter, more conservative<\/a>
\n This has led to less support for changes in immigration laws.\n <\/p>\n

View this post on Google+<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 2012, GOP-led statehouses overall gerrymandered districts to make their own safer, largely by shunting minorities and more liberal populations into Democratic districts, and making sure their own districts were more likely to vote Republican. \u00a0Thus, even though most of the population growth in the US since 2002 was among minority populations, the Republicans managed … Continue reading “The dark side of whiter voting districts”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106,9,358],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts","category-politics-law","category-poor-citizenship"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":132659,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2017\/01\/26\/making-the-electoral-vote-system-less-fair.html","url_meta":{"origin":36547,"position":0},"title":"Making the Electoral Vote system less fair","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 26-Jan-17 12:30pm","format":false,"excerpt":"We saw some noises about this in some states back in 2009, too, where -- upset that while the state went GOP at the state level, it voted \"winner takes all\" to the Dems in the presidential contest.The answer the state GOP in various places looked at -- and are\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":48104,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/11\/14\/predicting-the-political-future.html","url_meta":{"origin":36547,"position":1},"title":"Predicting the Political Future","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 14-Nov-14 11:36am","format":false,"excerpt":"After every election we get a lot of people making a lot of absolute assertions about what the election meant and, more importantly, how it heralds a change in the political landscape that is clear and will never, ever again be doubted.These are usually in the form of \"The Democratic\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":32226,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/01\/16\/meanwhile-back-at-the-electoral-shenanigans.html","url_meta":{"origin":36547,"position":2},"title":"Meanwhile, back at the electoral shenanigans","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 16-Jan-13 4:01pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I still don't call this plan\u00a0election-rigging per se. Because if congressional districts were fairly distributed, it wouldn't have any significant effect; indeed, it would arguably make the Electoral College more closely align with the Popular Vote.But congressional districts aren't, in most places, fairly distributed. Instead, they are gerrymandered by the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":26432,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/02\/15\/acting-against-their-own-interest.html","url_meta":{"origin":36547,"position":3},"title":"Acting against their own interest","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 15-Feb-12 6:41pm","format":false,"excerpt":"This isn't in the least surprising, since it's been previously noted that \"red\" states in general draw the most in federal benefits, overall costing more than they contribute to the federal budget. #ddtbReshared post from +Les JenkinsThe irony of this cannot be overstated. The people most likely to benefit from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":31297,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/11\/09\/planning-for-2016.html","url_meta":{"origin":36547,"position":4},"title":"Planning for 2016","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 9-Nov-12 8:59am","format":false,"excerpt":"I do not call this \"rigging the election* as it's not only perfectly legal but even, on the face of it, defensible. \u00a0But it is game-playing, and it is a concern for other reasons.The winner-takes-all nature of most electoral college challenges in US means that a slight advantage in the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":31926,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/12\/27\/less-swinging-less-splitting-more-stubbornness.html","url_meta":{"origin":36547,"position":5},"title":"Less Swinging, Less Splitting, More Stubbornness","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 27-Dec-12 3:15pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Nate Silver notes how swing districts have declined in recent decades, along with split tickets (a district going one way for Congress, another way for President). \u00a0Because of that, he notes that there's increasingly little incentive for more radical Representatives to compromise because their districts support them so strongly --\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36547"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36547\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36609,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36547\/revisions\/36609"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}