US Map

Population and Seats/Districts as of the 2020 Census



Redistricting Process


What is Redistricting?

To establish new voting districts, congressional boundaries are redrawn every ten years following the completion of the decennial census, by the United States Census Bureau. The process of redrawing these boundaries is known as redistricting. The goal of redistricting is to ensure that each district has an equal number of residents, while ensuring that the districts are drawn in a way that is fair and representative of the population. The two types of redistricting are congressional and state legislative. Both congressional and state legislative redistricting are used to redraw boundaries; the only difference is that one is used for federal while the other is used for state.

What is Gerrymandering?

The term gerrymandering dates back to as early as the 19th century when the Massachusetts governor signed into law a state senate district map. The map was used to favor the Democratic-Republicans over the Federalist Party voters as they were “thrown” into smaller districts, which reduced their say. Today, gerrymandering is known as the act of drawing district lines in a way that benefits certain political parties; this leads to underrepresentation and political manipulation. Representatives have the power to manipulate electoral outcomes during redistricting, thus guaranteeing their electoral success.

How is Gerrymandering Done?

Gerrymandering is done using two popular manipulating strategies: packing and cracking. Packing packs like-minded voters into as few districts as possible, whereas cracking splits like-minded voters with similar characteristics across different districts, thus diluting their votes.

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Insightful Information


Acknowledgments


We would like to sincerely thank the following:

► Special thanks to Dave's Redistricting. For more insights, check out this link

► Paul Ernest Lenze - Helping us with understanding fairness, view Paul's bio

► Peter Rock - Helping us with understanding GerryChain, he can be reached at peter@mggg.org