A Democracy Crisis Was Averted. But Gerrymandering Could Still Save the GOP.

[Nevilledog]

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2022/11/election-day-results-gerrymandering-democracy-voting-rights/


Before Tuesday’s election, the prognosis for democracy seemed bleak to outright apocalyptic. Republican election deniers were running up and down the ballot in key battleground states, threatening the future of free and fair elections. Armed vigilantes were guarding ballot drop boxes in places like Arizona, leading to fears of voter intimidation. Thousands of “Stop the Steal” activists had been recruited as poll workers and election officials, prompting worries of confrontations at polling places and vote counting centers.

Those worst-case scenarios for democracy have been averted so far. Things largely went smoothly during early voting and Election Day. There were few flare-ups at the polls or while votes were being counted. Election deniers lost key races for offices like governor and secretary of state in places like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, and New Mexico, with contests in Arizona and Nevada still close to call. At the state level in Michigan, voters defended voting rights by passing a ballot initiative requiring at least nine days of early voting, protecting access to vote by mail, and preventing partisan actors from overturning election results.

But that doesn’t mean that threats to democracy have all been extinguished or that GOP efforts to rig the political process didn’t succeed. Nearly 200 Republicans who questioned the results of the last election were elected to key federal and state offices, according to the New York Times.

And extreme gerrymandering may have given Republicans control of the US House and preserved GOP dominance in key battleground states. Republicans needed to win only five seats to retake the House, and according to Daily Kos Elections, the party picked up six open seats on Tuesday in Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, and Texas that the GOP gerrymandered. A Supreme Court decision in 2019 ruling that partisan gerrymandering cannot be challenged in federal court helped pave the way for these skewed maps, and recent high-court decisions reinstating racially gerrymandered maps in Alabama and Louisiana seats eliminated two additional majority-Black districts that would have almost certainly been represented by Democrats.

*snip*

[no_hypocrisy]

1. If New York was told to change their districts due to gerrymandering, why would another state

or states be allowed to keep their gerrymandered districts?

[Nevilledog]

2. Because GOP doesn't follow the laws

Gerrymandering shouldn't be allowed anywhere. It's constitutionally unsupportable.

[Johnny2X2X]

3. State by state

These go to state supreme courts. The NY supreme court struck down the Dem drawn districts. TX, FL, and WI supreme courts let their ridiculous districts go ahead.

[Salviati]

5. Because the violations were of New York State laws.

Other states are not subject to the laws of New York State.

That isn't to say that we shouldn't have some national level laws against gerrymandering (though it probably wouldn't pass muster with this supreme court)

[TheRealNorth]

4. If it wasn't for gerrymandering....

There wouldn't be any suspense about the House right now. Pelosi would be the Speaker for 2 more years.