Column by Thomas Suddes

Primary is best shot at removing congressional incumbent

quote:
A few months ago, Donald Trump carried Ohio. He drew about 51.3 percent of the state's vote, and Ohioans sent 16 people to the House. Of those 16 House members, 12 (or 75 percent) are Republicans, four (or 25 percent) are Democrats. Anyone wonder why most General Assembly Republicans (i.e., 66 of 99 state House members, 24 of 33 state Senate members) aren't in any rush to reform how Ohio draws congressional districts?


Thomas Suddes has new work. A former a legislative reporter with The Plain Dealer in Cleveland
Mr Suddes now writes from Ohio University where he is Assistant Professor; Coordinator,
E. W. Scripps School of Journalism Statehouse News Bureau fellowships.

Item from the Washington Post

Opinion -  Gerrymandering is the biggest obstacle to genuine democracy in the United States. So why is no one protesting?

By Brian Klaas February 10

Quote:

There is an enormous paradox at the heart of American democracy. Congress is deeply and stubbornly unpopular. On average, between 10 and 15 percent of Americans approve of Congress – on a par with public support for traffic jams and cockroaches. And yet, in the 2016 election, only eight incumbents – eight out of a body of 435 representatives – were defeated at the polls.

Gerrymandering, in a word, is why American democracy is broken.

P.S. Very informative video in the article - JB🇺🇸

The Daily Briefing: Kasich will not seek congressional redistricting in budget

The Daily Briefing: Kasich will not seek congressional redistricting in budget

Kasich wants congressional redistricting reform in state budget | The Columbus Dispatch

Kasich wants congressional redistricting reform in state budget | The Columbus Dispatchjavascript:void(0)

We Was Warned This Could Happen

Joan Fitz-Gerald Former President, America Votes; Former President of the Colorado State Senate 
Stealing The White House One Gerrymander At A Time

Less vs More and Less Wins Every Time

DAVID DALEY

David Daley is the CEO of the Connecticut News Project and the former editor-in-chief of Salon.  His byline appeared on this article dated August 19, 2016 on the website "Moyers & Company"

The Real Way the 2016 Election Is Rigged 

Report on Election and redistricting

It's not #democracy when politicians pick their voters. We need #redistricting reform NOW. pic.twitter.com/aLf4onalc6

— DemocracyIsForPeople (@democracy4ppl) August 12, 2016

Surprise from Gov. Kasich

Kasich Calls For Dramatic Reform To Congressional Redistricting

By Andy Chow  Dec. 23, 2015

While looking back at the state’s accomplishments in 2015, Gov. John Kasich came out with a firm stance to reform redistricting both in Ohio and nationally. 

Gov. John Kasich said he wants to see dramatic reform to the way voting districts are drawn to stop the practice known as gerrymandering, where a district heavily favors one political party.

Kasich says gerrymandering is forcing politicians to take up more extreme stances.

“It doesn’t matter whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat, I think we need massive…I think we need to eliminate gerrymandering, we gotta figure out a way to do it, we gotta be aggressive on it and we gotta have more competitive districts. That to me is what’s good for the state of Ohio and what’s good for the country,” said Kasich.

He made this announcement with the House Speaker and Senate President sitting just to his right. The General Assembly helped pass state legislative redistricting, but they’ve pumped the breaks on trying to change the way congressional districts are drawn.

Copyright 2015 90.3 WCPN Ideastream. To see more, visit 90.3 WCPN Ideastream.

Found this article on WOSU Radio web page

Brennan Center Analysis of Evenwel v Abbott

The Impact of Evenwel: How Using Voters Instead of People Would Dramatically Change Redistricting

A big upheaval could be coming for America’s state legislatures. On December 8, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument in Evenwel v. Abbott, a closely watched case from Texas that will decide whether states must change the way they draw legislative districts. The new analysis in this paper shows that if the Evenwelchallengers prevail, the nationwide impact will be far greater than previously assumed.

Like other states, Texas currently draws districts so they contain a roughly equal number of people rather than voters. Indeed, over the course of American history districts have overwhelmingly been drawn this way. But the Evenwel challengers say Texas’s legislative plans are unconstitutional because while districts may contain approximately the same number of people, many vary widely in the number of eligible voters.

So far, a lot of the attention around the case has focused on how changing the way districts are drawn would impact fast-growing Latino communities in certain states. And to be sure, some of the biggest changes would be in booming metro areas, such as Dallas, Houston, and Los Angeles, which have high numbers of both children and non-citizen immigrants. Latino majority districts, in particular, would become much harder to draw in many parts of the country.

But this new Brennan Center analysis shows the impact of a change would be far greater than expected and not confined to just a few states. In fact, if the Evenwelplaintiffs win and the rules are changed so lines must be drawn based on citizen voting age population instead of total population:

• Every state legislative map in the country would become presumptively unconstitutional under Equal Protection principles and would need to be redrawn.
   
• Nationwide, 21.3 percent of state house seats and 16.7 percent of state senate seats would be presumptively unconstitutional. In eight states, the percentage of house or senate districts with constitutional problems would be more than 40 percent.
   
• Redrawing maps to comply with constitutional requirements would require changing far more districts because of cascade effects from changes elsewhere on the map. 

Read the full analysis here .