If history is any guide, state elected officials can expect to face another contentious battle over drawing new congressional and legislative district maps once the 2020 census is completed.
After the 2010 census, elected officials in both political parties worked to draw new election districts and maps deliberately designed to benefit one party or candidate. The process of manipulating district boundaries on election maps in order to gain political advantage is called gerrymandering.
Technology available in 2010 allowed legislators to draw election districts that were politically “safe” for only one party, resulting in relatively few competitive elections. What happens in 2020 will greatly affect our representative democracy.
Legislators who can choose voters can undermine representative democracy by engaging in gerrymandering. This is one of the underlying causes of extreme partisanship in Washington, D.C., and state legislatures. A legislator in a politically “safe” district has no incentive to work toward bipartisan solutions or listen to independent voters or voters from the other party, essentially disenfranchising them.
Also, election challenges in “safe” districts tend to come from candidates who are politically more extreme than the incumbent, creating a disincentive to compromise for any incumbent who wants to be re-elected.
Egregious examples of partisan or racial redistricting exist in several states including Wisconsin, North Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Ohio, and Florida. All these states have been involved in extensive and expensive court battles over politically unfair and uncompetitive district boundaries.
While Minnesota has not experienced the extremes of gerrymandering found in other states, the state legislature and the governor historically have had contentious battles over redistricting.
In Minnesota, the state legislature is charged with redrawing district boundaries and the governor may veto the legislature’s redistricting plan. This process is time consuming and expensive. Minnesota courts have had to set district boundaries in four of the last five redistricting cycles because the legislature and the governor could not agree.
Interestingly, while Minnesota’s map-drawing process is contentious, its legislative elections are not. Most legislative districts are controlled by one of the two major political parties and only a handful of districts are politically competitive.
Unless Minnesota legislators agree to change it, Minnesotans will repeat this failed redistricting process again after the 2020 census.
The League of Women Voters recommends the Minnesota Legislature appoint a nonpartisan independent commission to advise the legislature on a fair redistricting plan. A fair redistricting plan is one that removes the inherent conflicts of interest that can arise when legislators choose their voters (instead of voters choosing their legislators).
Such a commission must comply with federal constitutional requirements and the Voting Right Act, promote competitiveness and partisan fairness and meet other requirements.
Several possible models exist for structuring this advisory commission. For example, companion bills introduced in the Minnesota house and senate (HF 246 and SF 370) propose creating a citizens’ commission of retired judges to advise the legislature on a redistricting plan that would ensure fair representation without having to rely on the courts.
Another possibility is to replicate Iowa’s redistricting process, which Iowa has used successfully since 1980. In Iowa, nonpartisan state agency staff draws up the initial redistricting plan.
Since the consequences of redistricting are so far reaching, we urge citizens to become more informed about the process and to ask legislators and candidates running in 2018 if they support a nonpartisan, independent redistricting process.
Kathy Tomsich is a member and former president of the League of Women Voters White Bear Lake Area.
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