Michigan facing loss of seat in U.S. House (Possible two)

WZZM13 ^ | 3/22/07 | TODD SPANGLER

[LdSentinal]

Michigan is likely to lose one of its 15 seats in Congress after the 2010 U.S. census - meaning the possibility of a little less clout in Washington, a little less attention from presidential candidates and the smallest delegation from Michigan in about 100 years, based on census numbers released today.

Even though the state's population grew by 1.6% over the last six years, it did so a lot more slowly than in states like Texas (13%), Arizona (20%) and Nevada (25%). That means reapportionment of the 435-member U.S. House will send seats from slow-growing or backsliding Northeast and Midwest states to the South and West.

"I don't think there's any chance of a turnaround, given the magnitude," Clark Bensen, whose Virginia-based firm Polidata researches population numbers for political clients, said Wednesday. "Unless Toyota moves into Detroit and takes over, you're going down."

Based on Bensen's projections for 2010, Michigan will be among a handful of states likely to lose a seat - Pennsylvania, Illinois, Iowa and Minnesota among them. New York and Ohio stand to lose two, he said.

His projections show Texas gaining four seats and Florida and Arizona two apiece.

Bensen noted that if reapportionment occurred today, Michigan would keep its 15 seats. But if the trends nationwide continue, it's unlikely after the next census.

It would then be up to the state Legislature to carve out districts among 14 seats.

Michigan has lost at least one representative after each of the last four censuses, from a peak of 19 after the 1960 census. The number determines how many Electoral College votes a state gets for president, with one for every Congress member and each of two senators.

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

I was mighty tempted to look around at "propitty in the pan-annle" when we drove through Amarillo last year. Some really nice folks there.

[ken21]

but democrap unions control nevada.

[HostileTerritory]

Remember, the VRA prohibits retrogression (or whatever it is that they call reducing the ability of minorities to elect the representative of their choice), and it has long been argued that due to lower turnout among minorities that having a majority-minority district is not enough.

Yes, but the difference between a metro Detroit district and a similar district in the South is that a larger share of the non-minority population can be expected to vote Democrat, giving African-American voters more say at a lower percentage of the population. The candidate of their choice can win the primary and then win the election with a lower share of the overall population in Michigan than in Texas or Mississippi, and those 70% black districts have been completely uncompetitive in this decade. A retrogression case would be novel but hard to prove, I think.

If MI loses a seat in 2010, its congressional districts will have around 736,000 persons. It will be impossible to draw two 60%-black CDs entirely within Wayne County.

The Census says there are 840,000 African-Americans in Wayne County. Split that population up 420,000 in each district, and you have two districts that are 57% Black and still overwhelmingly Democrat. By comparison: Kendrick Meek (FL-17), 57%
Alcee Hastings (FL-23), 51%
Hank Johnson (GA-4), 54%
John Lewis (GA-5), 56%
David Scott (GA-13), 41% (!)
Al Wynn (MD-4), 57%
Elijah Cummings (MD-7), 59%
Lacy Clay (MO-1), 50% (and a big slide down from the previous district, IIRC)
G.K. Butterfield (NC-1), 51%
Donald Payne (NJ-10), 57%
Gregory Meeks (NY-6), 53%
Stephanie Tubbs Jones (OH-11), 55%


I'm stopping here because I think the pattern is clear. There are a few districts with percentages in the low 60s in Chicago, Brooklyn, and of course Detroit, but the pattern here is that there's no requirement to be 65+% and it's not retrogression to get it into the high 50s.

[HostileTerritory]

If the GOP combines the heaviest Democrat parts of the Detroit area to draw two urban-suburban CDs that are 55% black and a third urban-suburban CD that is, say, 35% black, I seriously doubt that the DOJ or a court will strike down such a plan.

I'm sorry, I didn't see that your post was actually agreeing with the point I made in my first follow-up! Anyway, I agree, such a plan would have a good chance of passing muster with the DOJ if they could draw them artfully enough. I do stand by my assessment of the 7th district, based solely on the 2006 election results and the union-heavy nature of southeast Michigan. But I'm counting on Walberg to do much better in 2008 after that Schwarz business has been put to bed for a while and to take himself off the target list.

[lormand]

I don't think I have ever been to Amarillo.

I live north of Austin in the burbs and can see very fast growth around here.

[AuH2ORepublican]

While we are pretty much in agreement, I'm still going to quibble a bit with your post. : )

Yes, there are 840,000 blacks in Wayne County, and if you could split them evenly you would have two 57%-black CDs entirely within Wayne County. But you are forgetting that Wayne County is only 42% black, and there's no way that you could draw two Wayne County CDs so that none of the 463,000 residents of the county that are outside of those two districts are black. Assuming that 8% of those 463,000 residents are black, the most you could draw entirely within Wayne County would be two 54.5% black CDs.

BTW, my point about retrogression was not that drawing two 61%-black CDs in 2000 would be a reason for the DOJ or a court to charge the legislature with retrogression (as evidence of that, the 2001 MI redistricting was pre-cleared and never challenged successfully), but that it would be *arguable* that drawing two 65%+ black CDs would be required by the VRA when the old map had two 69%+ black CDs. It would especially true when they weren't drawing any additional black influence CDs while reducing the black percentage from 69% to 61%. My point is that if the legislature was arguably required to draw in blacks from other counties to avoid retrogression, it would trump any state provision that restricted its ability to split counties in redistricting.

[DouglasKC]

If two seats are gone, it's gonna be real fun watching the State legislature figuring out how to gerrymander districts for the Dems. Maybe John Conyers will finally decide to retire. Not likely. As Detroit and Wayne county continue to drop thousands of residents want to bet that the black caucus will demand more black representation?
That means the Republicans will have to give up a seat. Gonna be a great fight.

For sure. Republicans shouldn't have to give up any seats since I'm nearly certain that the population shrinkage is from Democrat areas.

[scrabblehack]

You may have a future in political consulting.

The last 6 seats (430-435) go to MI, OH, CA, GA, IL, and MN. The next states in line to get seats would be MO, FL, CA, TX, MA, and NY. I want to say that 7 seats turning in a decade is low, so I think TX could go to +3.

[MinorityRepublican]

there's a been a ton of gentrification and building activity in D.C. so I wouldn't be surprised if the population leveled off.

Actually, the population in D.C. is increasingly becoming white and affluent while the poor majority black population is now moving to Prince George's County, Maryland.

[ASA Vet]

Just declare Detroit a federal district

I'd rather declare De Toliet part of Canada.

[sphinx]

Clearly the pop. is moving South, Southwest, and West.

Actually, the pop. is moving north.

[mewzilla]

MI, NY, MA....

Folks are fleeing the 'Rat utopias. Go figure.

[sphinx]

RE: # 51. At the rate we're going, a quarter of the Congress will soon be "representing" illegal aliens. Maybe we should base reapportionment on citizens or registered voters.