Wisconsin’s current gerrymandering advantage makes it look far more corrupt than any state in U.S.
"Looking at Wisconsin’s efficiency gap of 13% in 2012 and 10% in 2014, he concludes that no other redistricting in the nation generated “an initial two-election sequence” of efficiency gap scores as large as those in Wisconsin. In short, the level of gerrymandering in Wisconsin is “virtually without historical precedent” over the last 42 years, he concludes.
Armed with this research, 12 Democrats from across the state filed a federal suit challenging the 2010 redistricting in Wisconsin. Retired UW-Madison Law School professor William Whiford, the lead plaintiff, told the media that “when it comes to the state Assembly, our votes just don’t matter.”
The group, whose effort has gotten funding from the Joyce Foundation and other foundations, will not target only Republican gerrymandering, says Sachin Cheda, a Milwaukee-based Democratic consultant. “It is our intention to file suits in other states, like Rhode Island,” he notes, where Democratic gerrymandering resulted in Republicans winning 35% of the statewide vote yet gaining just 13% of the seats in the General Assembly.
Lawyers from the Wisconsin Department of Justice have already filed a motion to dismiss the suit, which will be heard by a three-judge panel from the U.S. District Court in Madison and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit based in Chicago. The DOJ argues the lawsuit presents a “political” question the court cannot answer."
- See more at: http://isthmus.com/opinion/opinion/wisconsin-gerrymandered-election-districts/#sthash.7iGjpGLg.dpuf
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