Now that the Supreme Court has opened up the floodgates on partisan gerrymandering, many of the most important races determining which party is positioned to materially affect the public life of Americans will take place at the state level in 2020. The party that prevails in a number of key state races across the nation will dictate who ultimately has the power to redraw both state and congressional districts for the next decade.
Democrats rather famously took it on the chin in 2010 and have been suffering the effects at both the state and federal levels for the last 10 years. At present, Republicans maintain sole control of 29 state legislatures, while Democrats only control 18 state legislatures. As party leaders eye the upcoming cycle, the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee is specifically looking to regain control of at least one legislative chamber in Georgia, North Carolina, and Texas, while also hoping to seize full control of government in Virginia and Minnesota, according to The New York Times.
Meanwhile, Republicans will be pulling out all the stops to retain the strategic edge they gained in 2010. “We’re going to make sure we do everything we can to influence the elections because the future of the party for the next 10 years depends on it,” Austin Chambers, president of the Republican State Leadership Committee, told the Times.
In short, every damn vote will count in 2020. Every single one. Democrats will finally have the chance to undo so many of the harms that have been brought about by manufactured GOP majorities, at a time when the Republican Party has taken a distinct turn toward right-wing extremism.
As former Attorney General Eric Holder wrote in The Washington Post, "For too long, the Democratic Party has failed to focus on the state and local elections that impact the lives of American citizens on a day-to-day basis and determine who has a seat at the redistricting table. Although Democrats flipped seven governors’ mansions and hundreds of seats in state legislatures in 2018, there is still a long way to go."
The government should be deriving its power from the people, not from voter-suppression efforts or the gobs of unregulated dark money that pulse through our political system. 2020 is a chance to press the reset button in at least some areas of the country. Vote in 2020. Help change the world.