Dem
47
GOP
53
When Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) launched the mid-term Redistricting War, he apparently thought that it was a guaranteed win for the GOP. It's not turning out that way. In a normal election, Abbott would have gifted his party around 4 seats, to go with the one in North Carolina and the one in Ohio. That's been offset by probably five seats in California and one in Utah. Some of those were due to new maps pushed by politicians, others due to new maps ordered by judges.
Now, yet another judge has waded in, this time in New York. In response to a lawsuit filed by a firm aligned with the Democrats, Justice Jeffrey Pearlman found that NY-11 is an illegal racial gerrymander, as the latest round of maps did not properly account for the growth of the Black and Latino populations there. Pearlman ordered the district lines to be redrawn by February 6.
NY-11 is the only district in New York City represented by a Republican, namely Rep. Nicole Malliotakis. It includes the entire borough of Staten Island plus a chunk of Brooklyn. At the moment, it has a PVI of R+10, and is basically triangular in shape. On one side of the triangle is New Jersey. On the second side is water. And on the third side, NY-11 borders NY-08, NY-09 and NY-10, which are, respectively, D+24, D+22 and D+32. So, unless the GOP finds some Republican fish pronto, then NY-11 is going to get bluer, while the other nearby districts will remain safe seats. How much bluer is not clear, but it will almost certainly end up R+5 or bluer, which puts it into "toss up" territory.
There are still some redistricting battles going on, but when the dust settles, the blue team will probably pick up three seats in Virginia and maybe one in New Jersey, while the red team will probably pick up three in Florida and maybe one in Missouri. Under neutral political conditions, we'd be looking at something close to a wash. But this year is not likely to be neutral, and Texas, in particular, has taken some gambles that could blow up in Abbott's face in a blue wave, or anything like it. It is now possible—in fact, it may even be probable—that the Democrats will actually gain seats from the Redistricting War. That is certainly not what Abbott intended. And if that does come to pass (or even if it ends up being something of a wash), it will be a big feather in Gov. Gavin Newsom's (D-CA) cap, and a boost to his presidential hopes. (Z)