Okay, so there's been a lot of dispute about what the Maryland Congressional map, where Democrats control the redistricting process, should look like. I haven't drawn Maryland so far, so here's my input.
My goals:
1) Take out one of the two Republicans, making a 7-1 map. Make all seven Democratic seats completely safe.
2) Draw two Black VRA seats and one majority-minority seat.
3) Keep as many incumbents as possible happy-- that means, keep their house in the district, let them retain a majority of their constituents, make them safe in primary and general elections.
4) Preference is given to the two African-American representatives (Edwards and Cummings) who can whip the critical bloc of African-American Democratic state legislators, and the two white Democrats in leadership (Hoyer and Van Hollen).
Okay, let's look at the districts in detail.
Maryland-01
The old district lines are in violet, the new district lines in green.
The Eastern Shore district drops its weird Water contiguity arm into Anne Arundel.
It also drops Andy Harris' house in Cockneyville, and moves further west to weaken Rep. Roscoe Bartlett by taking some meaty, bright red rural precincts from him.
John McCain won this district 60.4-37.5, it is 84% White (VAP), and Harris already represents 79% of its people. The other 20% are moved over from Bartlett, and 3,000 from Ruppersberger.
Maryland-02
It's a pain to keep this hell of a gerrymander at least a little bit together, and to keep Ruppersberger's house in Cockneyville (yes, he's neighbors with Harris) in the seat.
However, I did it. The arm to Randallstown looks much different now, and he replaces the arm into Anne Arundel with an arm into Columbia (in a desperate to keep Sarbanes from all-too-certain doom by relieving him from the main new center of his district where primary challengers could draw strength from).
This district was won by President Obama, 60.7-37.2%. It is 65% White and 24% Black (once again, VAP, as always), and 51% of it was represented by Ruppersberger, 32% by Sarbanes. The leftovers are mostly from Cummings (some black Baltimore precincts propping up the Democratic performance) and 25,000 voters are moving over from Harris' seat.
Maryland-03
Ugh. Now this is just unsustainable. I tried to maintain at least some of the district, and I managed to somehow draw Sarbanes' house in Towson in here. But at some point you just can't sustain this gerrymander completely, especially as it's not even useful for us from a partisan perspective. At least, as I already said, I took Columbia out of the seat, robbing a potential primary challenger from there a good base for a run.
55% White, 25% Black, 10% Asian, 8% Hispanic- that racial mix should also help a bit with keeping Sarbanes in the seat. 64.2-35% Obama. 35% of the people here are old Sarbanes voters (that's a bit over 250,000), 24% come from Cummings, 20% from Edwards (no, these folks aren't black. It's the white parts of the 4th that were used to take out Morella in 2001), 13% from Hoyer and 5% from Ruppersberger.
Maryland-04
The fourth used to be a tool to crack Connie Morella's district in 2001. That's not needed anymore. Now she can relieve Central Maryland of its Republicans by taking those all in. Her base stays intact. Note: In this map I narrowly drew her city out of the district (Fort Washington. Most of it actually is in the 5th in the current map, now I gave her all of it). I corrected that mistake. It doesn't change the stats significantly.
Obama won 73-25.9, the district is 50.4% Black VAP, 37.9% White VAP, which should keep her safe from a primary challenge. 50% of it was already represented by her,7% by Hoyer, 20% by Sarbanes, 14% by Ruppersberger.
I think she'll like this district, and that her neighborhood is actually in it.
Maryland-05
Hoyer is appeased by keeping most of his district intact. It does lose its Prince George County portion and gains Annapolis instead, but that doesn't make it Republican enough to sink him.
Obama won this district 59.4-39.2, and Hoyer already represents 72% of it- the rest is split between four districts currently. It's 61% White, 30% Black, which should also keep him safe from a primary. He might actually like the drop in D-performance, as he's relatively moderate and probably has more to fear in a primary than a General election.
Maryland-06
Ah, Roscoe, it was nice to know you. Most proposals sink him by giving him Frederick and some of Montgomery, but, eh. Frederick isn't THAT blue, and it's been in Bartlett territory for years and years. That doesn't seem a smart move. Instead, I'm completely moving much of his district to the DC suburbs. That worked to finish off Morella, it'll work again.
Unless the leaked map, where Bartlett's district is just something like 57% Obama (I mapped it out), it's 60.3-38 Obama here. It's 63% White, 17% Black, 13% Hispanic, and Bartlett just represents 46% of it currently, with Van Hollen giving him 25%, Hoyer 15%, and Edwards 13%-- all super-blue districts.
No way he survives this.
Maryland-07
The leaked map is also dangerous in that while it does give Rep. Cummings Republican whites to go along with his Baltimore African-American base, they are kind of in the wrong place. Those people in Carroll County can be split between Bartlett and Harris, and help vote sink the one guy and be drowned out in the other seat. It's just useless to put them in a D seat.
Instead, I decided to help out the area currently represented by Ruppersberger and Sarbanes. That does screw over the configuration between those two, and with it it screws Sarbanes to some degree, but my approximation for the leaked map is that it gives Ruppersberger just something like a 55%-ish Obama seat. That's just unacceptable. With those Republicans going into Cummings' seat, it's still 70-28.7% Obama, 52% Black (VAP), 41% White. Most of the whites are Republicans though and won't bother Cummings in a primary.
They're also geographically not united, unlike Cummings' base.
He already represents 54% of the seat, with 20% coming from Bartlett, and 18% from Ruppersberger.
Maryland-08
The former DCCC chair Van Hollen keeps most of his district, but gives up some to help screw over Bartlett, and take on Frederick in turn. His seat becomes less white, at 49% White VAP, 17% Black, 17% Hispanic, and 15% Asian (hello, majority-minority!). It's 71-27.5% Obama, and he retains 73%, most of the remainder coming from Bartlett.
Thoughts?