With Court decision looming, WisGOPs try to protect themselves with new "fair" maps. NO SALE!

As Tony Evers was planning his State of the State address lsat night, the Wisconsin State Senate decided to jump into action.....to save their own phoney-baloney jobs.

Discussion includes using @GovEvers map as foundation, but tweaking it to pair fewer GOP incumbents. It also would seek to draw fewer GOP lawmakers out of their current districts.

Plan would include amending Iowa-style redistricting bill on today's calendar with maps.

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— JR Ross (@jrrosswrites) January 23, 2024

Wisconsin Senate votes 17-14 to pass bill with new Republican-drawn maps.

Four Republicans joined Democrats in voting against it: @SenBallweg @SenBradley @SenatorKapenga and @EricWimberger

It now heads back to the Assembly

— Scott Bauer (@sbauerAP) January 23, 2024

The scheme came together too quickly to run the numbers on what the changes do for possible election outcomes, but I did find the Legislative Council's attachment with the maps that the GOP passed.

Then less than 24 hours after the Senate put the maps through, Speaker Robbin' Vos and the rest of the GOPs in the State Assembly sent the scheme off to the Governor.

Assembly Republicans voted Wednesday to send a set of legislative maps to Democratic Gov. Tony Evers' desk that they argue make "minuscule" changes to his own proposal, with the intent of avoiding pitting GOP incumbents against each other.

Lawmakers voted 63-35, on party lines, to approve the bill.

The vote comes about a week before two consultants are set to submit a report analyzing several map proposals submitted as part of a redistricting case before the state Supreme Court, which declared the current legislative maps unconstitutional. The court said it is prepared to draw maps if Evers and the Republican-led Legislature cannot reach an agreement.

What a pathetic, desperate measure. And transparently done to protect Republican incumbents who might now see their homes located in the district of another GOP legislator. Which was rightfully called out by one of the leading proponents of the anti-gerrymandering movement in Wisconsin.

Let me be really clear that we shouldn’t care where Democrats live or where Republicans live, it should never be a factor, in my view. No double standards, we just should take it off the table as a factor.

— Sachin Chheda (@skchheda) January 23, 2024

If these GOPs want to stay in the Legislature so badly, just move to an open district. This happens all the time with regular redistricting….unless one party wants to rig it so that it doesn’t happen.

And coming up with this scheme and jamming it through both houses of the Legislature in 24 hours without any public hearing, breakdown of the results, or input from pretty much anyone beyond the gerrymandered GOPs at the Capitol? With no analysis whatsoever as to how the outcomes of the districts might change?

NO SALE. And Evers has rightly promised to laugh this last-minute GOP panic scheme out of his office.

BREAKING: my promise to the people of Wisconsin is that I’d fight for fair maps, so I’ll be vetoing the maps passed by Republicans today.

Moving legislative district lines so GOP-gerrymandered incumbents get to keep their seats is just more gerrymandering.

Basic stuff, folks. pic.twitter.com/M3dZvds5Ip

— Governor Tony Evers (@GovEvers) January 24, 2024

Or put another way.

I suppose the WisGOP Legislature's stunt allows Vos and LeMahieu to whine on KLAN Radio 1130 and try to turn the idea of “gerrymandering” on its head to mean “endangers incumbents who previously benefitted from gerrymandering.” But I don't think it's going to fly with the 2/3 of this state that don't marinate in a Bubble of RW BS.

It's telling how the GOPs are flailing around, given that an evaluation on the maps from academic consultants is set to be released next week. The WisGOPs are clearly not acting like a group that expects to have a favorable outcome from the state or federal courts, and seem flat-out frightened by the prospect of what maps the SCOWIS might put out by March 15.

Which is all the more reason not to get in the Court's way, and let this pathetic GOP attempt at "fairness" to die a hilarious death.