WisGOP tries absurd BS to support latest gerrymandering scheme

After denying that they would try to go around Governor Evers by passing a joint resolution on redistricting (which cannot be vetoed, but is questionable as to whether it has the force of law), tomorrow the Republicans at the Capitol want to do just that.

The state Assembly will vote Tuesday on a resolution backing a policy to “retain as much as possible the core of existing districts.”

The Rules Committee added the resolution to the Assembly calendar one day after the state Supreme Court agreed to take original jurisdiction in a redistricting suit.

The conservative voters who filed the suit argued that the Supreme Court should make “the least number of changes to the existing maps as are necessary to meet” various requirements if the Legislature and guv are unable to reach an agreement.

One line in the Assembly Joint resolution states the new seats should, “Retain as much as possible the core of existing districts, thus maintaining existing communities of interest, and promoting the equal opportunity to vote by minimizing disenfranchisement due to staggered Senate terms.”

Funny how these concerns of keeping “the core of existing districts” together didn’t seem to be a big deal to WisGOPs when they took control of state government in 2011. Here’s an example of how Republicans screwed around districts in the Milwaukee area, as part of what has been quantified as the worst state government gerrymander in America.

First the 2000s.

Here's what it looks like today.

And it was no coincidence.

Let’s not forget just how absurd the redistricting process was when Republicans had complete control a decade ago. Here’s then-State Senator Leah Vukmir picking and choosing the neighborhoods in her district. https://t.co/drYyl95cLz https://t.co/3ZqLrqeMut pic.twitter.com/QaaTaWf5V1

— Dan Shafer (@DanRShafer) September 27, 2021

Similar chicanery from a decade ago resulted in (among many tricks) Sheboygan and Waukesha being cut in half between 2 Assembly districts, giving a sizable amount of countryside to a district based in Wausau but no real suburbs, and moving a Senate district that was based in Central Wisconsin to include the Western Wisconsin cities of Sparta and Tomah.

Patrick Marley called out the double-standard that WisGOPs are trying to pull in an article in the Journal-Sentinel today, using the raw numbers that illustrate just how much manipulating the Republicans pulled in the last redistricting.

Moving so many voters raised concerns for federal judges in 2012. A panel of three judges that year noted that about 320,000 people needed to be moved into new Assembly districts to balance the populations of the districts. Instead, Republicans moved nearly 2.4 million voters into new Assembly districts as they drew maps to maximize their advantage, the court noted.

Similarly, lawmakers needed to move about 230,000 voters into new Senate districts but instead moved 1.2 million of them. (While all of those voters were placed in new districts, many of them stayed on the same election schedule and didn’t have to wait an extra two years before they could vote in a Senate race.)

That last point also reveals GOP Assembly Number 2 Jim Steineke to be full of crap, because he tried to say that changing Senate districts would cause a lot of Wisconsinites to wait 6 years to vote for a State Senator, and therefore the districts should be kept as-is as much as possible. But Marley notes that the WisGOPs did just that to more than 300,000 people after 2010.

Along those lines, it’s telling that the Assembly GOP’s “draw your map” website lists which Senate districts are changed (it’s a cool data list, feel free to click here to check it out, then go to Summary Report and click the "disenfranchisement" tabs). So they are likely going to try this lame argument in court, even though they didn’t care about this at all after 2010. Because shamelessness is what gets you ahead in the GOP in 2021.

Any WisGOP who goes along with this garbage tomorrow doesn’t get to run any ads in the next year saying how “independent” they are, because voting to keep these manipulated and rigged maps in place is as hacky as it gets. We need to watch the roll call, and not allow this sleazy move to be memory-holed.