The long and winding road redistricting battle in Pennsylvania looks to be finally over. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court handed down a new congressional map on Monday after the old one was struck down for being an illegal partisan gerrymander in favor of the Republican Party, and there’s a very high chance that it will be the map used on November 6, 2018. Sure, the state GOP, angry about how this new map looks, may try to appeal this to the US Supreme Court, but they already tried that once a few weeks back and the appeal was dismissed. Simply put: it’s very hard to see this map getting overturned by the SCOTUS given how they already ruled, and it’s not clear if the GOP will even waste the effort of filing the appeal. So, given all of this, the map handed down on Monday could play a pivotal role in determining who controls the US House majority after this fall’s elections. Therefore, it is essential to break down this map and examine the changes made, how they affect 2018, and what to watch for in the coming weeks:
A Quick Note
As you may have heard, the PA Supreme Court decided to renumber the districts and so many of the old districts do not have the same numbers that they used to, and I will be referencing this throughout the piece.
Safe Democratic Districts: 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 18th
Districts 2, 3, and 4 are equivalent to the old 1, 2, and 13, centering around Philadelphia. The new 2nd District is the old 1st District, held by Bob Brady, who is retiring due to scandal-related issues. Thus, Rep. Brendan Boyle, who currently represents the 13th and whose house was drawn into this district, may jump over and decide to run for this one. The PVI switches from D+31 to D+25 which isn’t much of a change and is still safely Democratic. The new 3rd District is the old 2nd, represented by Rep. Dwight Evans and it will get a tad bluer, from D+40 to D+41, still one of the bluest CD’s in the country. Expect Evans to still be representing this area next year. Then there’s the new 4th District/old 13th located in Montgomery County, which will go from D+15 to D+20. As previously mentioned, Boyle now no longer resides in this district but since it’s the most similar to his current one, he may just decide to stay here. Either way, this is safely blue.
The big change was the 5th District, which was the old 7th. The old 7th was one of the best gerrymanders out there, snaking through deep blue Delaware County and into more Republican Chester and Berks County. The goal was to cheat the Democrats out of what should have been a safe blue seat, turning it into a swing district held by the now-disgraced Rep. Pat Meehan. Every redistricting plan, from the GOP plan to the Democratic plan, knew that the 7th was going to become safely blue in any new map and the court followed through. This new seat, renamed the 5th, is located almost entirely in Delaware County and is a lot more tidy looking. Its compactness in a blue area means its PVI swings all the way from R+1 to D+13 and will be the easiest pickup anywhere in the country for the Democrats this fall, especially since Meehan has been pushed out over his own creepiness.
Lastly we have the new 18th District, or the old 14th District which is located on the other side of the state, centered on Pittsburgh. It gets a tad redder, from D+17 to D+13, but it is still an easy Democratic hold for Rep. Michael Doyle.
Safe Republican Districts: 9th, 11th, 12th, 13th, 14th, 15th
These are the big and rural districts that blanket the majority of the landmass of the state. First up is the 9th District, which is Lou Barletta’s old 11th District. Barletta is vacating it to run a bad campaign for Senate, and this open seat is getting some changes. The old district cut across a bunch of counties in the eastern half of the state and had an R+10 PVI. This new 9th is more spread out and grabs a lot of Republican areas, ceding its more Democratic side to a new competitive district (to be mentioned later). As a result, its new PVI is R+14 and the nature of it as an open seat could make things very interesting (you’ll see later on).
Next is the new 11th District, which is the old 16th. Rep. Lloyd Smucker (all-time great Congressional name) is one of the only Republicans who will be really happy with this map, as his old seat was just R+5, while his new one is R+14. His old seat was a lot of rural GOP turf, along with the Democratic cities of Lancaster and Reading and chunks of Chester County in a bizarre “arm flexing” shape. His new seat loses Reading and Chester County and is mostly just Lancaster and a lot of red in the surrounding parts of Lancaster County and York County. Smucker dodged having to run a tough race against a Democrat and his place is more secure now.
Now we’re going to go rapid fire through a couple of these. The new 12th is largely the old 10th, encompassing parts of over 15 different counties, most of them fully, in the north-central part of Pennsylvania. The PVI’s are nearly identical, R+16 vs R+17, and Tom Marino will have an easy hold of this region. The new 13th is the old 9th, containing a number of counties in the south-central part of Pennsylvania. Retiring Rep. Bill Shuster’s replacement will have no problem hanging onto this blood red district. The new 15th is the old 5th in northeastern Pennsylvania, with 12 full counties inside of it and parts of a few others. Very empty and rural turf, the PVI goes from R+13 to R+20 as the liberal college town of State College was taken out, but regardless, a simple hold for Glenn Thompson.
Finally we come to the 14th, which I skipped over for a reason. It is the old 18th District, which has a special election going on very soon. That special election will take place with the old borders and with a PVI of R+11 it is a long shot for Democrats, but surprising up-and-comer Conor Lamb has made it a tight race. The reason it’s even competitive is that that district contains pieces of Allegheny County, a very Democratic area and the home of Pittsburgh. This new iteration is redder and even more of a stretch for Democrats, going from R+11 to R+14 as that suburban Allegheny area is subbed out for some blood red rural turf. But that doesn’t necessarily mean bad things for Democrats, as the suburban area that was taken out was added to a different district that is way more competitive than either of these (see below) and if Lamb is to win the special election, he could run in that new district as a pseudo incumbent, since his house is geographically closer to that swing seat.
Democratic Pickup Opportunities that just got tastier: 1st, 6th, 7th
Prior to this new map, Democrats had some clear pickup opportunities in southeastern Pennsylvania. None were going to be easy, but all were going to be clear openings. Of the main 4, the old 6th, 7th, 8th, and 15th, one became safely blue (the aforementioned new 5th/old 7th), while the other three all moved slightly, but potentially decisively, in the Democratic direction. The one that remains most similar is the New 1st/Old 8th. The old 8th was unusually tidy for such a messy overall map, being almost solely in purple Bucks County and then grabbing a piece of Republican territory in northern Montgomery County. This new 1st District is very similar, still encompassing Bucks County, but instead grabbing a Democratic piece of Montgomery County, which makes the PVI change ever so slightly from R+2 to R+1. Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick is still going to have a tough battle on his hand and now the playing field got a tiny bit tougher for him.
Then there were key changes in the other two districts. In the 6th district, which is amazingly the only one of the 18 that has the same number as last time, the partisan voting index swung four points, from R+2 all the way to D+2. In the process, it went from a Clinton +1 to a Clinton +10 district and also made it that much harder for Rep. Ryan Costello to hold. The old 6th was ugly, starting in Chester County, snaking into Montgomery County and Berks County but missing Reading, and ending up in Lebanon County. This new 6th sits calmly in Chester County and then grabs Reading out of Berks County, which was very bad news for Costello, given the blue nature of that city. And so Costello has a decision on his hands. Even though he lives in Chester, because he represented many parts of the new and safely red 9th district, he could probably get away with leaving the 6th open and deciding to run for the 9th instead. If he does that, or retires rather than face a battle where he’s probably an underdog, this seat would become Lean D or worse. It’s a pivotal decision, but not an easy one.
And then we have the new 7th District, also the old 15th. Both versions contain Allentown, but the old one had a long red tail coming off of it, making its PVI R+4 and it a Trump +9 district. The new 7th is much more compact, putting Lehigh and Northampton Counties together and grabbing a blue piece of Monroe County, making its new PVI D+1. With strong incumbent Charlie Dent already retiring, this is a mighty tough hold for Republicans, given that Clinton won this district by 1 point in 2016 and Obama won it by 7 in 2012. Democratic recruiting for the old 15th had been sluggish, but now that it’s that much more favorable, expect it to speed right up. This is going to be an uphill fight for the PA GOP.
One new swing district and two new fringe Democratic pickup opportunities: 10th, 16th, 17th
First up in this interesting batch is the new 10th District, which is very different from the old 4th. The old 4th actually touched the Maryland border and only got parts of Democratic-leaning Harrisburg. The new 10th gets all of Harrisburg, Hershey, York, and Carlisle, which makes the PVI go from R+11 to R+6. The current Representative is Scott Perry and though he lives in Harrisburg, he faces a Costello-like conundrum. Does he stay in his old seat and fight a competitive battle, or does he drop down to a safer red one? His option would be to go to the 11th, but unlike in Costello’s case with the open 9th, the 11th was Smucker’s district, which we already mentioned. The 11th has pieces of the old 4th that Perry held, so again, it wouldn’t quite be carpetbagging. Democrats were hoping that if a Harrisburg district was drawn it would include Schuylkill so that ex-Rep. Tim Holden could make a comeback. Even though that didn’t happen, they have another potential hope, State Auditor Eugene DePasquale (also a great name). He won a statewide race in 2016 and did well in the Harrisburg area, which is where he is from. Despite the R lean of the district, if Perry flees or DePasquale gets in, or both, this could be a dark horse Democratic pickup option.
This new 16th, a version of the old 3rd, is what’s called a big time reach. Encompassing the Democratic Erie County and a bunch of red counties along the Ohio border, the old version of this was an R+11 CD, while the new one is R+8. That difference could be enough to put in play in the right environment, like say, 2018. Rep. Mike Kelly will presumably run for reelection and should be a clear favorite, but if Erie County Executive and ex-Rep. Kathy Dahlkemper gets involved, perhaps it could come into play. Like I said, a big time reach, but possible.
Lastly we come to the new 17th, or the old 12th, currently represented by Rep. Keith Rothfus. The old version of this district was R+11 and a safe red seat. This new version is a clear swing seat, with just an R+3 PVI. Why? Well, the old version had Beaver County, parts of suburban Pittsburgh, and a whole bunch of rural red turf to the east to make sure it was safe Republican. The new district is Beaver County along with suburban Pittsburgh in Allegheny County, with much of that being the part of the old 18th that was subbed out. And when I mentioned that Lamb could run as a pseudo-incumbent in a swing seat, I was talking about this one. Whether or not he wins the special election in March, I’d expect Lamb to make a run at Rothfus here. He’s built a strong personal brand in a very red district and running in a much more friendly district, against an incumbent who’s never run a competitive race before, is a very enticing option for Lamb.
That one swing district that’s held by a Democrat and will likely still be held by a Democrat: 8th
This district was formerly the 17th, represented by Matt Cartwright. It packed Democratic voters from Scranton, Wilkes-Barre, and Coolbaugh together in a district with a long Republican tail. That made it an R+1 district. This new 8th has those same areas, but instead of a red tail, it’s just a compact wedge in the northeast corner of the state, encompassing 3 full red counties to balance it out and keep its PVI at…. R+1. Cartwright is a very strong incumbent and no one really considered him vulnerable under the old map and I don’t think anyone will consider him vulnerable under the new map, either.
So what does this all mean?
I’m going to break this concluding section into two parts, one looking at implications of the new map and another at the whole argument over whether it is “fair or not”. This first section is pretty clear to me. This map helps make probable Democratic pickups much more likely. And it helps make 5-6 Democratic pickups in the right environment far more likely. Many people will say that yes, Democrats were already going to have a good shot at picking up 2-3 seats under the old map. The thing is, all of those were districts with Republican PVI’s and were not necessarily easy. In a wave, or even just a D+7/8 environment, those facts probably wouldn’t have mattered. But in a D+5/6, it might have. This new map makes those pickup opportunities far easier to flip and more likely to flip even if a massive wave doesn’t come. Thus my line about making probable pickups much more likely. As a whole, the PVI’s of Dem pickup opportunities go from R+2, R+1, R+2, R+4, R+5, R+11 to R+1, D+13, D+2, D+1, R+6, R+3. That’s a whole lot more favorable, even if many of those were already in play. So as a whole, this new map simply makes it so that Democrats probably have to win the national house popular vote by less than they previously did in order to win a majority.
Is this map “fair”? Or is it a partisan gerrymander?
Republicans don’t like this, as I previously mentioned. Some people even went as far as to say that this map is a Democratic gerrymander (that was my initial reaction before I realized how bad of a take that was). While I don’t want to pull an Obi-Wan Kenobi on you, the fact is that whether you see this as a fair map or not probably depends on your definition of what gerrymandering is and what the best solution is. This is a map that, as much as possible, was drawn to proportionally represent the statewide results. Donald Trump won Pennsylvania by less than one point and he won 10 of these 18 districts. That’s pretty close to proportionally partisan by statewide result. It is far more likely now that the party that gets a majority of votes for the US House statewide will get a majority of PA’s US House seats, or at least a tie. At the end of the day, if your ultimate goal in this process was to make it so that the lines were cute and compact and allowed “natural” geographic advantage to come into play (looking at you, Dave Wasserman), then this looks good for Democrats. If your ultimate goal in this process was to make it so that the party with the most votes wins a majority of seats, then this map looks pretty darn fair to me. Much like beauty, gerrymandering is in the eye of the beholder.
Bonus Note
Thanks for reading! Starting next week, I will be rolling out my US House ratings, so keep an eye out for that. Adios!