We don’t lose *all* the close elections when they count a sentees and provisionals, it just feels that way. Buerkle won in NY-24 in 2010 when they counted all the votes (she was behind on election night). And many of our candidates have seen their slim leads hold up.
As for the AZ redistricting commission, not only did it draw a pro-Democrat gerrymander, it was not created by the state legislature and thus I would posit that it violates the U.S. Constitutio, and I’m not the only person to feel that way. Here’s a description of a case for which SCOTUS already has granted certiorari:
“Consider a challenge by Arizona Republicans to the state’s congressional districting map. Arizona voters created an independent redistricting commission in 2000 in an effort to take politics out of the process. But the GOP-led state legislature complained in a lawsuit that the Constitution exclusively gives power to draw maps for congressional districts to elected state lawmakers. A divided panel of federal judges dismissed the lawsuit, but justices said Thursday they will review the lower court ruling.”
The issue here isn’t whether redistricting commissions are permissible—many states have had them for years, albeit as creatures of the legislature, with the legislature presumably being able to get rid of them—but whether the state legislature can be kept completely out of the process by a voter initiative. This is similar to the argument that, had Colorado voters approved a referendum to amend the state constitution in order to allocate EVs proportionally instead of winner-takes-all (it was voted down in 2004), it would have violated the U.S. Constitution’s empowering of state legislatures to direct the manner in which electors are appointed (Art. II, sec. 1, cl. 2). While the argument for prohibiting voter initiatives to override the legislature is less directly textual in the case of redistricting than in the case of appointing electors, Art. 1, sec. 4, cl. 1 does give the state legislature the power to establish the time, place and manner of electing Representatives, which presumably is from where state legislatures obtain their power to draw districts in the first place.
If the AZ commission is declared unconstitutional, it would permit the GOP legislature to undo the Democrat gerrymander that the “independent” commission created and redraw the map so that AZ elects 7 Republicans and 2 Democrats instead of its current 5 Democrats and 4 Republicans (which will be 5-4 GOP if McSally holds on in AZ-02). Moreover, it could lead the Florida legislature to challenge the “Fair Districts” constitutional amendment approved by FL voters in 2010 (via initiative) that required the legislature to draw geographically compact districts, without which the GOP would have a firmer supermajority of the congressional delegation.
California is interesting. The state GOP Chairman (ex-state Senator Jim Brulte) is a bright guy. He openly admits that it’ll take several election cycles to become competitive again.
The state Senate elections were not as bad as they looked. Freshman state Senator Andy Vidak was a top DemocRAT target, but he won 56% in against a well-funded opponent in a district that hasn’t voted Republican for President since 1988. Janet Nguyen picked up a vacant Democrat-held seat by a landslide in a race considered a tossup. And Downey Councilman Mario Guerra came within 3% of winning a district that gave Obama around 70% in 2012 and where Republicans make up less than 1/4 of the voters. We may be hearing from him again soon. Republicans successfully defended all their incumbents by wide margins.
Here is the latest on the doubtful Congressional races:
AZ-2 retired Air Force fighter pilot Martha McSally leads British-born incumbent Ron Barber by 509 votes.
CA-7 ex-Congressman Doug Ose leads freshman incumbent Ami Bera by 2,183 votes.
CA-16 Johnny Tacherra leads longtime incumbent Jim Costa by 741 votes.
CA-26 Freshman incumbent Julia Brownley leads state Assemblyman Jeff Gorell by 1,028 votes. Ironically, Gorell leads in the Los Angeles County portion of the district while trailing in the Ventura County portion, which contains the vast majority of the voters.
CA-52 Freshman incumbent Scott Peters leads San Diego Councilman Carl DeMaio by 4,391 votes. I’m not optimistic about this race.
NY-25 Geriatric incumbent Louise Slaughter leads Gates Mayor Mark Assini by 582 votes. As another Freeper pointed out, given her aggressive defense of partial birth abortion, it’s appropriate that she married a man whose last name is Slaughter.