Urged on by Trump, GOP to fight Pennsylvania's district map

MSN / AP ^ | February 20, 2018

[SMGFan]

Urged on by President Donald Trump, Republicans vowed Tuesday to fight Pennsylvania's new court-imposed map of congressional districts, as dozens of candidates assessed their chances under newly formed districts and the odds that a federal court could block them.

Republican members of Congress and Pennsylvania Republican lawmakers planned to sue in federal court as early as Wednesday in a bid to block a map expected to improve Democrats' chances at erasing the GOP's U.S. House majority. The new map substantially overhauls a GOP-drawn congressional map that has helped produce a predominantly Republican delegation and was widely viewed as among the nation's most gerrymandered.

[SMGFan]

Lead the way Pres Trump!

[edie1960]

Absolutely, every legal recourse must be taken to save Pennsylvania (the only northeastern state remaining with a modicum of sense)!!!

Best of luck and prayers to President Trump in this battle!!

[SueRae]

Umm..they planned doing that regardless of a tweet or lamestream spin.

[rfp1234]

Legislating from the bench should be an impeachable offense.

[edh]

I thought this issue was dead for the most part & that the idiots (Dem idiots ... I should clarify) won. I guess there’s still a fight (thought I thought this was already “fought” when Alito shot it down).

Do you think Alito shot down the Republicans fighting these idiots due to the complaint being filed prior to the PA Supreme Court actually shoving the new districts down our throats? I really hope that’s the case.

I will not sit here and defend PA’s gerrymandered districts ... they’re ridiculous (many are remnants of Dem’s wanting ultra-safe districts). However, this precedent of a state’s SC being able to perform the job of the state legislature is absurd.

If we do fail here in PA, someone needs to file lawsuits in Massachusetts and Connecticut. Using liberal-logic, we should have about 5 of those seats ... they’re all gerrymandered to give Dems every single one of them.

[Political Junkie Too]

The Pennsylvania GOP should go to the Supreme Court and argue equal protection.

There is nothing equal about the Pennsylvania court rejecting their redistricting, while:

• Sheila Jackson Lee (D) can have her district in Texas.

  

• Eric Swalwell (D) can have his district in California.

  

• Mark DeSaulnier (D) can have his district in California.

  

• Frederica Wilson (D) has her district in Florida.

  

• Elijah Cummings (D) has his district in Maryland.

  

• Alcee Hastings (D) has his district in Florida.

  

• Jim Clyburn (D) has his district in South Carolina.

  

Let's post more maps. Clearly, there isn't any equal protection for Republican Congressmen in Pennsylvania to have the same redistricting rights as Democrats across the country.

-PJ

[FredZarguna]

Inaccurate.

It's nice to have the President's endorsement, but the PA GOP announced plans to take the legal challenge to the US Supreme Court, if necessary, weeks ago.

[x]

Some of those districts were drawn up in order to be African-American seats. Since Black Democrats are all concentrated together in a single district, the other districts are more likely to elect Republicans.

Republicans look at the maps and accuse Democrats of gerrymandering. Democrats look at who gets elected in the other districts and accuse the Republicans of gerrymandering. But the real argument should be between Black and White Democrats.

[Teacher317]

Personally, I think the new map looks more proper and less gerrymandered to bring about a certain result. The ratio of perimeter-to-area is much lower. I would support legislation mandating that all electoral maps have a perimeter-to-area ration below a certain number. Nothing will utterly eliminate gerrymandering, other than permanent district lines, but this would greatly diminish the potential for abuse.

[Teacher317]

Compare for yourself -

Current:

Proposed:

Numbers 4, 5, and 8 are the only large districts that are NOT ridiculous. In the proposed map, none are clearly reaching out for certain areas.

[Kid Shelleen]

Add Luis Gutiérrez to your list.

[Michael.SF.]

are you sure you have those correctly labeled? The bottom one looks more contiguous.

[VeniVidiVici]

Personally, I think the new map looks more proper and less gerrymandered to bring about a certain result. The ratio of perimeter-to-area is much lower. I would support legislation mandating that all electoral maps have a perimeter-to-area ration below a certain number. Nothing will utterly eliminate gerrymandering, other than permanent district lines, but this would greatly diminish the potential for abuse.

For decades and decades the Democrats controlled the statehouses and gerrymandering was never an issue.

Now that Repubs have taken many stateshouses it's become an issue.

[SharpRightTurn]

“Do you think Alito shot down the Republicans fighting these idiots due to the complaint being filed prior to the PA Supreme Court actually shoving the new districts down our throats? I really hope that’s the case.”

Good question. I had forgotten Alito had turned this down and it would be interesting to know if it were due to failure to exhaust remedies before going to the SC.

[Political Junkie Too]

Add Luis Gutiérrez to your list.

Will do.

This one is the worst.

-PJ

[fieldmarshaldj]

That map is deliberately designed to steal 5-6 Republican seats and give the PA Democrat MINORITY of voters a majority of seats.

[Ciexyz]

This crap affects my district, PA-18.

[lightman]

It affects my District (formerly 19, before the last census, now 4) by fragmenting what for generations had been York, Adams, and Cumberland counties...York will be split for the first time ever between 10 & 11.

I am really beginning detest the Judicial branch.