The New Census Numbers
A Small Win for Republicans; But Lots of Drama Await. And There are Other Issues
The starting gun for the horse race known as congressional and state legislative reapportionment - drawing of new state legislative and US House district lines - was fired Monday. The horses are now out of the gate, and a few states have grabbed an early lead - the ones gaining seats due to population gains over the past 10 years.
But there is other news in the numbers. Of course, the Census’s work is just beginning. They will need to provide lots of detailed population information to state legislatures and release much more demographic information on the United States from the 2020 decennial census. Much more. Racial composition and trends; age cohort growth and declines; marriage and birth rates; the list is almost endless.
Before we tackle congressional redistricting, let’s knock one thing out of the way; the slowest rate of population growth since the Great Depression (1930). While our nation grew by some 22.7 million people - the populations of our six largest cities combined - the rate of growth was 7.4%. For some on the left still clinging to their copies of Paul Ehrlich’s scary 1968 tome, “The Population Bomb,” which predicted mass starvation and inspired an apocalyptic movie based on the year 2022, Soylent Green, that’s comforting. For those who run federal programs like Social Security retirement, a transfer program whose financial health requires lots of younger workers paying into the system with an aging population, that’s disconcerting. For home builders, car makers, and others, population growth means new customers, more income, and a pool of available workers.
As the New York Times reported on Monday, there are now more people over the age of 80 for every person under age two. Our fastest growing cohorts are those over 65 - “Baby Boomers,” for the large part, who were born between 1946 and 1964 - who will comprise 1 in 5 Americans by 2030. But is there a need to panic? Yes, birth rates are on the decline, and immigration - at least the legal variety - has held constant for several years. And yes, Social Security and Medicare are approaching insolvency. There are barely more than 2 workers paying in for every recipient - it used to as high as 10:1.
But those programs beg for reform once Congress conjures up enough courage and foresight to tackle it. An issue for another day, and my friend and former Social Security trustee, Dr. Charles Blahous, has written extensively and persuasively on this issue. I defer to him.
But panic, not just yet. No question that Millenials, born between 1980 through 1996, who actually outnumber Boomers, are slow to the gate in marriage and birth rates. That’s probably going to change. The pandemic and the economic uncertainty it created probably didn’t help much.
And yes, immigration reform is long overdue in Congress. Both sides have some excellent proposals - I am especially fond of Sen. Tom Cotton’s (R-AR) approach that mirrors Australia’s and Canada’s point system based on the needs of our economy over one that is more focused on family and “chain migration,” but he needs to raise his annual cap on the number of new immigrants. Both sides need to give up “poison pill” issues that are non-starters. There’s a deal to be had. Again, a topic for another day, but now immigration reform along with incentives for couples to get married and have children (upping the child tax credit) should get a new look, sooner rather than later.
Now, redistricting. Two things are noteworthy. There is no surprise in the growing population shift from the northeast to the south and parts of the Mountain West. That’s been happening for decades now. But California is losing a congressional seat for the first time since it became a state in 1850. That is noteworthy.
Also not noteworthy - the shift of electoral votes from states Biden carried to Trump states. Just 3. Yawn. The number of Americans now total just over 331 million and the average US House seat will be home to a bit more than 760,000 Americans. Congressional seats have on average have nearly doubled in size over the past 50 years, as the number of voting House seats have remained constant at 435.
Also noteworthy is the paucity of seats shifting from some states to others. No state is losing more than 1 seat; in prior years, New York and others have lost multiple seats; only one this time, and they almost kept it. Texas is the only state gaining 2 seats; others, just one, including Florida. Arizona is gaining nothing, which surprises me. No surprise with the other states. It’s nice to see Montana get its second district back again, after about 30 years. Some thought Minnesota and Alabama might lose seats. Nope. Given that New Jersey leads in net migration loss, they’re not losing a seat as they did in 2010.
Noteworthy: Puerto Rico’s population dropped nearly 12 percent, a loss of more than 400,000 people. That may hurt efforts to make them the 51st state, but they are still home to nearly 3.3 million people, compared to our least populated state, Wyoming, with 570,000 people.
But the most noteworty item is not from the census, but the growth of “independent commissions” over the past decade that will draw these many of these new district lines. Not everywhere, and some commissions have more power than others. California, despite being deeply Democratic, will rely on a very independent and bipartisan commission to draw their lines. Montana and Colorado will see lines drawn by independent commissions. The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) has a nifty interactive chart so you can see how each state determines the drawing of new district lines. But the southern states gaining seats, including Texas, rely on state legislatures to draw congressional district lines. The legislatures in those states are all controlled by Republican, except North Carolina, which has a Democratic governor).
A side issue worth watching - the constitutionality of some independent commissions. Those not created by ballot initiatives could be challenged if certain politicians don’t like their work.
Among the other states losing seats, New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio rely on their respective legislatures; Michigan has an independent commission. New York’s government is controlled by Democrats; Ohio’s by Republicans. In Pennsylvania, Republicans control the legislature but Democrats have the governorship and a majority of the partisan State Supreme Court, which drew a Democratic map for the 2018 elections that decimated GOP-drawn seats from the 2010 census, helping increase Democratic ranks by +4.
Some think Republicans may stand to add about 2-4 seats from this demographic shift. But who knows what the political climate will portend around Election Day, or how the legal system may intervene (and lawsuits are inevitable). But that sounds plausible. Democrats currently hold a 6-seat advantage over Republicans, but remember, all district lines for every US House district are likely to change, even where states don’t see new or lost districts. Why? Due to population shifts within states.
Some of the factors to watch for as the process unfolds:
In states losing a seat, will a Member of Congress vacate a seat to run for higher office? In Ohio, for example, Democratic Rep Tim Ryan is running for an open US Senate seat (Rob Portman is retiring). That gives map makers an easy target for eliminating a district. In New York, Democrats are likely to look to the elimination of upstate mostly GOP seats - they may toss a couple of Republicans into the same district. One drama to watch, in New York. There is still a lot of hurt being felt from Brooklyn US Rep. Alexandra Ocasio Cortez’s role in taking New York, and her district, as a home for Amazon’s new east coast headquarters. But Sen. Chuck Schumer wants to do nothing to entice her into a Senate primary against him in 2022. She survives.
In Pennsylvania, it is possible that one or more of the House members will run for retiring Republican Pat Toomey’s Senate seat, or in an open gubernatorial race. We’ll see. Ultimately, I suspect we will see the imperious progressive Governor, Tom Wolf, refuse to work with legislative Republicans, leaving it again to the partisan State Supreme Court with partisan redistricting that eliminates a GOP seat, or at least forces Democrat and a Republican incumbents into the same district that may favor the Democrat. But that may prove hard to do given the partisan damage they’ve already done. There may not be that many new opportunities for mischief. But Republicans have learned from the US Supreme Court’s refusal to address malevolence in the way the Keystone State handled the 2020 election, along with the 2018 redistricting that they will also not be able to rely on them to stop shenanigans by the state’s highest court, no matter what the Constitution says.
It would be nice to predict that “in a perfect world,” this or that would happen. I know the strategy I would take - see where the population has grown the most, and create new seats there; in other states, focus on where the loss has been greatest, and eliminate seats there, while keeping districts compact and contiguous, including communities with a common interest together as much as possible. No weird “barbell,” or “three headed dog” shaped districts. Fair.
But in politics, there is no perfect world. Only imperfect politics. Fairness will be in eye of the beholder. Many lawyers will remain gainfully employed. Stay tuned.