I noticed that Colorado, Nevada, Virginia, and Oregon districts were trending to the Democrats across the board. In Colorado the average district went from R+4 to D+2. Every district moved at least three points more Democratic. None of those were surprises.
What was a surprise was the states that are moving Republican. I expected to find Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and West Virginia on the list. I was very surprised Massachusetts moved so far to the right. MA-1 and MA-8 pretty much stayed the same. The other 8 districts, however, moved on average from D+13 to D+7. Since I included only 2000 and 2008, there was no John Kerry effect. Massachusetts isn’t moving to the GOP any time soon, of course, but this would explain how Scott Brown could win an election. A D+13 state would be out of the question, but if it was still moving right, a D+5 or D+6 state can be won by a Republican. This suggests Brown was no fluke and that there may be congressional opportunities later in the decade depending on how the state is redistricted.
The other state that surprised me was New York. On the surface it doesn’t look like a big deal. The state moved 2.3 points more Republican between 2000 and 2004 and another 1.1 points between 2004 and 2008. Some of the districts, however, moved heavily to Republicans. The 8 districts that moved an average of 8.7 points more Republican had one thing in common, they were white majority districts in the New York metro area. In fact, there was only one white majority district that didn’t move at least 5.3 points more Republican. While NY-14 didn’t move more Republican, the other Manhattan district, NY-8 went from D+30 to D+21. That doesn’t put the district in danger of flipping to the GOP, but NY-1, NY-2, NY-4, and NY-9 all moved Republican enough that a Republican nominee might win them. If not in 2012, then in 2016.
What this tells me is that there’s a chance that the White majority areas in Long Island, Brooklyn, and Queens may be moving enough Republican that GOP congressional challengers could win these districts within the next decade. The one hurdle they’ll have to overcome is that redistricting could push these districts out of reach. Republicans need to make sure that these districts aren’t gerrymandered and left similarly. Republicans will have a good chance in the ones that keep moving to the GOP. We don’t know which ones will, so they should go for an equal shot in all of them. They don’t need to worry about creating safe seats for King or Grimm. The areas is moving far enough to the right that almost any redistricting will create districts each can win.
The stories circulating out there are that Republicans will settle for a 21-6 map, because that would “fairly” take out one Republican and one Democrat. I don’t understand how settling for 22% of the districts in a state where even John McCain got 37% of the vote is fair. Right now 9 districts have a positive McCain PVI and another 4 are moving that way. There are another 3 that may get there this decade.
If a map that isn’t gerrymandered in favor of the Democrats enables Republicans to be competitive in 13 districts, or even just 9, settling for 6 seats is shooting themselves in the foot. New York represents the greatest opportunity for Republican pick-ups in the next decade. Unless the Republicans settle for a map that makes 21 Democratic seats safe.
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