Last night’s election results shifted the balance of power in redistricting battlegrounds, flipping state legislatures. We have gerrymandered maps, and they favor Republicans to a significant degree, and we know that other states will consider redistricting efforts in the months ahead that will further attempt to entrench Republican power,
said Greta Neubauer, the Democratic leader in Wisconsin’s state Assembly, adding, And so we will be considering a congressional redistricting effort.
Democrats won trifectas in Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, a reversal of the structural advantage Republicans held since 2010. In Texas and Georgia, the incoming Democratic control of the governor’s mansion and state House could prevent further redistricting, though outgoing Georgia Governor Brian Kemp has ruled out a last-minute gerrymander in his state.
State-Level Election Law Changes
Voters signaled clear preferences on election laws beyond redistricting. In Missouri, they rejected a redrawn map that local Republicans had used in the primaries before it was legal, and approved an amendment to impede politicians from overturning citizen-initiated ballot measures. North Dakota, South Dakota, and Utah rejected measures that would have watered down direct-democracy rights, while Massachusetts voted to permit same-day election registration and Virginia guaranteed voting rights restoration for people convicted of felonies.
Ballot Measures Confuse Voters
Some election-related ballot measures were difficult to interpret. In Maryland, a confusing amendment, which an academic noted if I didn’t know what that amendment was about, I would have no idea what that amendment was about,
seems to have cleared a legal path for Democrats to try and eke out an extra seat. On voter identification, North Carolina and Ohio voted to extend or entrench existing requirements, while Nevada opted to create new ones. However, Arizona, Colorado, and California rejected comparable proposals. Alaska, Arkansas, Kansas, South Dakota, and West Virginia approved measures banning non-citizens from voting, though this was already prohibited in each state.
