Geopolitical Maps

Several states will have their gerrymandered maps changed before the next election, and it will have huge consequential impact on the 2024 House of Representatives Election. With only a five seat majority, seven states potentially redrawing their maps could sway the election towards Democrats or Republicans.

Alabama

This is the map with the highest chance of changing – the Supreme Court for the second time struck down the Republican legislature-drawn illegally gerrymandered map this past month. Alabama’s population is over 25% Black, and Republicans had given just one Black majority seat for the entire state. Seven congressional districts proportionally should make two of the districts majority-Black. This level of racial gerrymandering was one of the last remaining pillars of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and many feared that the Republican-supermajority Supreme Court would strike down the proportional minority clause of the legislation. However for the second time, the Supreme Court shot it down.

South Carolina, Louisiana, Florida, and Georgia

These four states have similar problems with Alabama – a lack of Black representation – but their cases have not advanced as far. Under proportional representation all states should gain a Black seat, where Louisiana should have 2/6 Black seats, South Carolina also 2/6, Florida 2/28, and Georgia 5/14.

New York

In 2022, the Democratic New York state legislature attempted to pass an extreme 22-4 gerrymander that was struck down by the State Supreme court. New York State got a fairly drawn map where Republicans managed to pick up four seats in the state, making the state almost solely responsible for Democrats’ loss in November. Currently waiting a likely appeal to the State Supreme court (which has a new chief justice), the Democratic legislature is trying to initiate a large, but not as extreme gerrymander. This map won’t put Brooklyn’s hipster neighborhoods in the same districts as Trump-loving suburban Staten Island.

North Carolina

North Carolina might be the sole bright spot for Republicans – after attempting a gerrymander of their own in the last redistricting cycle, their map was struck down by the then Democrat-controlled State Supreme Court. Now in Republican hands, the court is likely to rule in favor of the Republican legislature, turning a 7-7 map into a one with a potential 10-4 Republican advantage.