Mad at Congress? Gerrymandering makes members tough to unseat
Angry town meetings of Senate and House members, the latest Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz. and Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., make excellent TV footage and are stoking liberals' hopes for sweeping Democratic victories in 2018.
Not so fast.
Because of pervasive gerrymandering, only about 10 percent of the 435 members in the U.S. House of Representatives come from genuine, competitive "swing" districts. Not surprisingly, competition for these districts yields some of Congress' most competent members.
But wait!
Isn't Washington supposed to be different? With an even playing field? Our state has a bipartisan redistricting commission, two Democrats and two Republicans, plus a nonpartisan non-voting chair. They design congressional and legislative boundaries every 10 years.
The post-2010 process, however, made races for Congress in Washington decidedly lesscompetitive.
Our state went into the process with three competitive House districts, and one more open to challenge. We came out with just one "swing" district out of ten. A rundown:
--2nd District: U.S. Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash., endured close, tough races in his old Northwest Washington district. It had included Democratic strongholds (Bellingham and Everett) along with conservative rural Whatcom, Skagit and Snohomish Counties.
The district was reconfigured to hug the Coast from Bellingham south to Mukilteo, giving Larsen a much safer district. The congressman's only trouble in 2016 was a far-left primary challenge, by a candidate who claimed to represent "the 99 percent". On primary night he was getting 9 percent.
--3rd District: U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash., flipped the Southwest Washington district from "D" to "R" in the 2010 Republican landslide. She has been the state's lowest profile member of Congress with its highest absenteeism rate, largely due to a baby with severe health problems.
Herrera Beutler made out like gangbusters in the post-2010 redistricting. A big block of Democratic voters in Thurston County was excised from the 3rd District and put into the new 10th District. The 3rd had flipped in 1994, 1998 and 2010. It was made far more Republican.
--8th District: U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert, R-Wash., had four tough races in a row, capturing and holding a suburban/exurban King and Pierce County District. A skilled top aide, Mike Shields, recognized the people skills of the old sheriff: An accessible, affable Reichert outfought his foes. .
The post-2010 redistricting pushed Reichert's district across the Cascades, giving him two Republican bastions in Chelan and Kittitas Counties. Although it gave Hillary Clinton a tiny margin in the 2016 presidential race, Reichert has a far safer district this decade.
The redistricting commission drew up just one competitive district. Its master boundary designer, ex-Republican a U.S. Sen. Slade Gorton, described the 1st District as the most closely balanced House district in the nation.
The 1st District is an ungainly beast: It starts in the Snoqualmie River, swings north to take in technology centers of Kirkland and Redmond, and then includes all the rural areas taken out of Larsen's district. It wraps around the U.S.-Canada border to take in the small liberal enclave of Lummi Island.
U.S. Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Wash., has taken a hold on the district. Republicans have nominated candidates far too conservative for Kirkland and Redmond.
Why the sinecures? Backscratching.
The Democrats wanted the new 10th District, and they wanted it for veteran Olympia insider-entrepreneur Denny Heck. Heck had lost to Herrera Beutler in 2010. Hence, a "Denny district" was designed with its base in Thurston County.
The Dems also wanted a majority-minority district, and got it with the rejiggered 9th District, extended north to include Southeast Seattle.
Longtime U.S. Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., was challenged by ex-State Rep. Jesse Wineberry, who played the race card. Smith deployed advantages of diligent representation, and blew Wineberry away by a 56-14 percent margin in the primary.
Republicans' had their back scratched by solidifying holds on two seats. Reps. Reichert and Herrera Beutler were given much safer districts.
Where does that leave us? Longtime voices on the Seattle left -- The Stranger and the HorsesAss.org web site -- continue to wail at Reichert. They have yet to lay a glove on him.
Reactions to securing a safe seat are different. Larsen has continued a tireless round of town meetings. So have Reps. Derek Kilmer and Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., both with safe seats. But Reichert holds no town meetings and is far less visible and accessible than he was a decade ago.
British Columbia, near to the north, is holding its provincial election. At stake are 87 seats in the B.C. Legislature. The party that wins a majority gets to form the government.
As many as 30 B.C. legislative seats are known to swing back and forth. Federally, the Liberal Party of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2015 won 17 B..C. seats in the House Commons, up from two in the 2011 election.
We almost never have swings like that down here. The last, in Washington, came in Republicans' 1994 sweep.
Here and across America, there are boundaries to voter anger -- congressional district boundaries. They are formidable barriers to any anti-Trump tide in 2018.
By: Joel Connelly
Source: SeattlePI