The data that has been released from the US census does posit a very interesting avenue into how Congress might look in the coming decade. To put that succinctly, the data stated that the country has been diversifying and urbanizing at a much faster rate than what most predicted and that could definitely change the entire outlook of Congress and the representatives sitting inside. The news is generally good for the Democratic party- but the Republicans might be hit hard with this rapid diversification.
The new Census will lead To Shifts In Voting Preferences
For the Democratic Party, the census data suggests that most of the anticipated losses in the elections of 2022 may be mitigated to a certain extent by population growth in most of the urban centers of the country. As it stands, these centers tend to vote for the Left-wing- whereas a decline in the rural population would harm the chances of the Republican party.
David Wasserman, in his analysis of the Cook Political Report, mentioned that although the Republicans did have major sway in redistricting, the Democrats would be pretty elated with the results today.
It is proven that every single census requires the redrawing of the boundaries of the state- which would roughly assure equal representation across every single district. This is precisely why the allotment of every state has the size of their respective delegations varying with a change in population.
According to the 2010 report, most districts had a population of 711,000 people. Currently, the population has reached 761,000 people. This does beget a major change in the redrawing of congressional maps.
While it is ascertained that the numbers that the census came up with this week don’t really affect the chances of a Republican House of Representatives, it does make the task a lot more difficult.
