[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 173 (Thursday, November 21, 2024)]
[House]
[Pages H6172-H6177]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PARTISAN GERRYMANDERING
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 9, 2023, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Nickel) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. NICKEL. Madam Speaker, I rise today to discuss the urgent need
for Congress to act on partisan gerrymandering in the United States.
The FAIR MAPS Act is a bill I have authored. We will talk about that
today. This is a huge problem for the U.S. Congress, and I am glad to
have the chance to speak about this today. I am joined by one of my
outstanding colleagues from the great State of North Carolina,
Congresswoman Kathy Manning.
Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur), my
friend and colleague, to speak on this issue.
Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me,
and I really want to thank him, first of all, for his FAIR MAPS Act.
Ohio is the poster child for unfair maps. If you look at a State that
voted twice for President-elect Trump and twice for President Obama,
you would think that, for example, if the State has 15 Members, that
it would be 8 and 7, you would sort of try to divide it equally because
of 15 Members of Congress from Ohio and what is fair is fair.
What has happened in Ohio, because of a veto-proof legislature, due
to gerrymandering in Ohio, in both chambers, what happens is that out
of 15 seats, our side of the aisle, in Columbus, what they did down
there, we have only 5 Democrats out of 15, only 33 percent, not 50
percent out of the 15. To be fair, if you have 15 seats, maybe it
should be 8 and 7, you know, but to give us equal voice based on the
public's right to full representation. Ohio is really the poster child
for radical gerrymandering.
Recently, the polls showed that three-quarters of the people of Ohio
wanted reform, and they wanted to set up a special independent
commission to draw the districts in Ohio. The vast majority of people
wanted change.
What happened? In Ohio, that issue was put on the ballot, but the
secretary of state, who has been part of this veto-proof, one-party
rule in Ohio that has become corrupt actually--Ohio is an extremely
corrupt State right now, I am sad to say. People have gone to prison
and more will go to prison because absolute power corrupts absolutely,
including in gerrymandering.
There was this initiative that was placed on the ballot that the
people voted to put on the ballot, but what did the secretary of state
and attorney general in Ohio do? They wrote a gerrymandering
proposition that was placed on the ballot that took up 3 pages. When
the people went in to vote, just reading that, on these computers that
we vote on now, took so much effort, the measure failed by a small
margin because they were afraid. They didn't know what it was exactly,
and it was made so complicated. Study Ohio as a classic case of hurting
the people and not giving fair representation.
I just wanted to place that on the record so that those who are
listening across this Chamber, across the intelligent media in our
country, and the people of Ohio could hear this because they are not
being represented fairly, and voices are being suppressed. That really
goes against the very principle of one person, one vote and one person,
one mind, to be able to have all of those views properly reflected.
I thank the Congressman for introducing the FAIR MAPS Act and
focusing on this really critical matter of a democratic voice for the
people of the United States of America. I can't compliment him enough.
I am proud of his work and thank him for doing this.
Mr. NICKEL. Madam Speaker, I am grateful to my colleague from the
great State of Ohio, a true champion for Ohio families.
Madam Speaker, I am going to talk about this a lot today, but in
1984, we had 190 Members elected to Congress in split-ticket districts.
These are districts that voted for President of one party and a Member
of Congress of another. This election, it looks like we are down to 13.
Representative Kaptur was one of those and has a great story to tell.
Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms.
Manning).
Ms. MANNING. Madam Speaker, I thank my good friend from North
Carolina, Representative Wiley Nickel, for holding this Special Order
hour so that we can talk about such an important issue, an issue that
strikes at the very heart of our democracy, and that is gerrymandering.
Last year, in my State of North Carolina, the Republican-led general
assembly passed blatantly gerrymandered congressional districts
engineered with one clear purpose: to reduce the number of Democrats in
Congress.
These new maps deliberately distort the will of the people,
systematically diluting the votes of Democratic-leaning areas, like my
district.
Communities of interest were split, districts were manipulated with
surgical precision, leaving many voters voiceless in the very
communities they call home.
In my own Sixth District, the city of Greensboro, a city of 300,000
people, was split into three parts. Each piece combined with farflung,
ruby-red, rural districts. The majority of Greensboro was drawn into a
district stretching across 10 counties all the way to the Tennessee
border. In doing so, the new maps also separate the heart of Greensboro
from High Point and from Winston-Salem, effectively dismantling a triad
district, a community of interest that deserves cohesive
representation.
Remarkably, and not coincidentally, the newly drawn Sixth District
gives a 16-point advantage to a Republican candidate over a Democratic
one. As someone who has lived in Greensboro for four decades, I am
outraged by the brazen disregard Republicans in Raleigh have shown the
citizens of my district.
Let's be clear. This is not democracy at work. This is political
manipulation at its worst, designed not to represent the people but for
partisan gain.
I want to give a little bit of history about how ridiculous this
gerrymandering is and what has taken place, because the Republican-led
legislature in North Carolina did the exact same thing in 2021. Despite
their own statements that they would keep communities of interest
together and avoid splitting counties, they drew a map back then that
split my former triad district into three pieces and split two
counties.
My constituents brought a lawsuit. The North Carolina Supreme Court
found that the partisan gerrymandering, which the court found, based on
presentations by esteemed statisticians and computer experts and other
experts, that extreme gerrymandering was done with surgical precision
and that that violated the North Carolina State Constitution.
The court ordered the maps to be redrawn, and eventually they had to
appoint a three-judge panel to redraw fair maps. That panel, two
Republicans and one Democrat, redrew the maps to keep communities of
interest together and to avoid splitting counties. The result? In a
truly purple State, where voters have just elected--well, I am going to
come back to that. In a truly purple State, the voters elected seven
Republicans and seven Democrats to the U.S. House of Representatives.
Now, that was in 2021.
[[Page H6173]]
{time} 1130
What happened to those same maps in 2023? That same North Carolina
Supreme Court that found that gerrymandering was not allowed under the
North Carolina State constitution was now dominated by Republicans, and
they actually reversed their prior decision. They decided that extreme
partisan gerrymandering is just fine in the State of North Carolina.
There were no new facts, no new communities of interest, no new
counties, no new law, no new North Carolina constitution, just new
Republican Supreme Court judges.
The result of those new maps drawn with no guardrails by our
Republican-dominated general assembly, well, North Carolina, the State
that just elected a Democratic Governor, a Democratic Lieutenant
Governor, a Democratic attorney general, a Democratic secretary of
state, and a Democratic superintendent of public instruction will, next
term, have 10 Republicans and only 4 Democrats in the House of
Representatives.
Thanks to the hypocrisy of our supreme court, the elected officials
of our State have decided whom they want to represent rather than
allowing the voters to decide whom they want to represent them.
In a democracy, the voters should choose who represents them, not the
other way around.
That is why I was so proud to join my fellow North Carolinian
Democratic delegation colleagues, including Congressmen Wiley Nickel
and Jeff Jackson, whose seats were also targeted by the partisan
Republican gerrymander, to introduce the Redistricting Transparency and
Accountability Act.
I thank my colleague, Representative Wiley Nickel, for that
legislation.
The legislation goes after the partisan, secretive redistricting
process, which, in North Carolina, Republicans used to overhaul the
balanced, fair maps that I described earlier that were in place for the
2022 election by enhancing public input and increasing transparency in
the map-drawing process. The maps this time around were drawn in secret
with no legitimate public input.
Additionally, I am proud to cosponsor the Freedom to Vote Act, which
seeks to put an end to partisan gerrymandering once and for all.
This critical legislation will ensure that all North Carolinians,
Republicans and Democrats alike, have the right to fair representation.
While these gerrymandered maps will prevent me from continuing to serve
my constituents in Congress, the fight for fair districts is far from
over.
Madam Speaker, I want to take a moment to thank the hundreds of
constituents who have called me, texted me, written letters, emailed
me, and stopped me in the public streets to tell me how disgusted they
are by the extreme partisan gerrymandering that will prevent me from
continuing to represent them. I appreciate their support. I want them
to know what a true privilege it has been for me to represent them and
the communities I love so much in the Sixth District of North Carolina.
I will continue to stand with all those who fight for a system where
every voter's voice is heard and every vote truly counts.
Mr. NICKEL. Madam Speaker, I thank my friend and colleague from North
Carolina. She deserves to have a fair shot to come back to Congress and
the ability to continue representing her constituents. She was robbed
by partisan Republicans in the North Carolina General Assembly, which
gerrymandered our State with surgical precision.
This is a huge problem not just for North Carolina but for the entire
rest of the country. Voting rights have been under the legislative
microscope for years now, with threats to roll them back and add
obstacles for voters who want to cast their ballots.
Madam Speaker, I firmly believe voters should choose their
politicians; politicians should not choose their voters. North
Carolinians deserve a fair and transparent electoral process that
ensures that every voice and every vote is heard and accounted for.
This shouldn't be a partisan or political issue. It is about fairness.
In States and in places where voters have a choice, where they are
allowed to put ballot initiatives on the ballot, they vote
overwhelmingly for fair maps to bring balance to the U.S. Congress, but
the fact of the matter is that 90 percent of the people in this
Congress come from districts that are gerrymandered or safe seats for
Democrats or Republicans. Less than 10 percent of the seats in this
body are in seats like the one that I won in 2022 that are truly
competitive and that could go either way. That is what gerrymandering
has done to this Congress and to this country.
We are on track, Madam Speaker, to be the least productive Congress
in our Nation's history, and if you want to put your finger on one
thing, it is 100 percent partisan gerrymandering, which is wrecking our
democracy and the U.S. House of Representatives. It is far past time
that we end this.
This, for me, is a personal issue. It is why I got involved in
elected office. As a former staffer for President Obama, I traveled all
over the country and all over the world with him during his first term
in office and his first campaign. When he left office, like many, I was
sad. I was tuned in for his farewell speech, where he said if you want
to fix the way things work in Washington, then grab a clipboard, get
moving, and get organized.
I took those words to heart. I grabbed my clipboard and was elected
to the North Carolina State Senate in 2018. As he left office,
President Obama said the one thing that we have to fix in this country
to bring politics back to the center is to end partisan gerrymandering.
He has continued to be a leading voice on this issue, putting his time
and attention toward ending partisan gerrymandering.
It was one of the main reasons I put my name on a ballot back in 2018
to run for the North Carolina State Senate, and then, as I was elected
to the senate, I continued to work on this issue in North Carolina. The
top issue for me was voting rights and an end to
partisan gerrymandering in the great State of North Carolina.
In the State senate, I served on the North Carolina Senate
Redistricting Committee, where I got to see firsthand how Republicans
targeted communities of color with surgical precision as they drew maps
that disenfranchised voters across the State. I saw firsthand how the
process works and the way that politicians picked their voters instead
of allowing voters to choose their politicians. They circumvented the
transparency that came with drawing fair maps.
I spoke out against partisan gerrymandering as a State senator over
and over and joined with so many others--Democrats, Republicans, and
Independents--in North Carolina to outlaw this practice. Then, I was
reelected again to the North Carolina Senate, and we continued to fight
on this issue.
In 2021, a 4-3 Democratic court, our Supreme Court of North Carolina,
drew fair maps for North Carolina. They responded to partisan
gerrymandering from Republicans in the legislature, but they didn't
draw Democratic maps, and they didn't draw Republican maps. They drew
fair maps.
They drew maps that, in all likelihood, would have elected seven
Republicans, six Democrats, and one seat that could have gone either
way. That was the seat that I won. That is North Carolina's 13th
District. In a 50-50 State like North Carolina, which is a true purple
State, we elected Donald Trump in the last election, but we elected a
Democratic Governor and Democrats up and down the ballot.
Madam Speaker, you would expect to have seven Democrats and seven
Republicans. That is what North Carolina sent for the 118th Congress,
seven Democrats and seven Republicans. We won a Republican-leaning
seat. It was an R plus 2 seat. It could have gone either way, but the
best ideas won at the ballot box.
Right now, we have maps that are fair. This is the current map right
here. Madam Speaker, you can see seven Democratic seats and seven
Republican seats. There is North Carolina's 13th District right there.
You can see this is what maps look like. There is no packing and
cracking. These are maps that represent communities of interest, that
represent the State, and that allow voters to have a real choice in
whom they send to Washington. This is what maps should look like.
Again, this North Carolina 13th District, by some accounts, was
exactly in the middle of the U.S. Congress. It is
[[Page H6174]]
one of the most fair districts in the country. It is a competitive
district where every vote is critical to our election. We won by 10,000
votes. It was a close election, but we were able to do it in a fair
map.
Again, we got to have a real debate over the best ideas and whose
party had the best ideas, and the best ideas won. In the same election
when I won this district in North Carolina by a small margin, two seats
flipped on the supreme court from Democratic to Republican, taking the
court from 4-3 for Democrats to 5-2 for Republicans. They have proven
over and over again that this extreme partisan MAGA court is nothing
more than a rubber stamp for a MAGA Republican legislature.
In February, after the 2022 election, the North Carolina Supreme
Court relied on a rarely used procedural rule to rehear the 2022
partisan gerrymandering case, Harper v. Hall, and took the incredibly
unprecedented step of reversing its prior ruling on April 28. This
opinion, authored by Justice Michael Morgan, charged the majority with
improper motivations and willful blindness.
Madam Speaker, I am very glad and grateful to be joined by Democratic
Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who I understand is here to join and put his
name and his voice behind this incredibly important piece of
legislation and this incredibly important push.
I will say this: It looks like we are on track to have a 220-215
Congress. The three seats that Republicans gerrymandered in North
Carolina with surgical precision are going to be the difference in this
election. There are still a few more votes to count, but that is why I
expect we will land a three-seat majority for the Republicans.
Had North Carolina had the chance with fair maps to send Democrats
back, a 7-7 delegation, then I would be addressing him as Speaker
Hakeem Jeffries.
Madam Speaker, I yield to the distinguished gentleman from New York
(Mr. Jeffries).
Mr. JEFFRIES. Madam Speaker, I thank the distinguished gentleman from
North Carolina, Representative Wiley Nickel, for yielding and for his
leadership on this incredibly important issue around prohibiting
extreme partisan gerrymandering across the country and certainly in the
great State of North Carolina.
I thank Representative Wiley Nickel for his extraordinary leadership
in this Congress.
I thank Representative Kathy Manning for all that she has done to
combat anti-Semitism and for many other issues throughout her time in
Congress.
I thank Jeff Jackson for his leadership and certainly congratulate
him on his continued journey as a public servant as the next attorney
general from the great State of North Carolina.
These are three extraordinary public servants who were elected by the
people but then unable to continue to serve not because of any decision
made by the people of North Carolina, but because of extreme partisan
gerrymandering by far-right extremists in the North Carolina
legislature and this MAGA North Carolina Supreme Court. It is an
extraordinary thing.
As Representative Nickel has indicated, the people of this great
country should determine who represents them. We shouldn't have so-
called representatives making the decision as to the people whom they
will represent.
There has been a lot of talk in the aftermath of this most recent
election about an extraordinary and overwhelming mandate. Let's just
look at the State of North Carolina.
I congratulate the incoming President on his success in North
Carolina--a close race--on his success in North Carolina and in every
other battleground State. In that very same State, every single
Democrat running statewide for constitutional office won, proving
the point that North Carolina is an evenly divided State. It is a 50/50
State. That should be clear to anyone.
When fair maps were drawn in advance of the 2022 election, the North
Carolina congressional delegation, upon the success of Representative
Wiley Nickel in an evenly divided district, was seven Democrats and
seven Republicans. That is the will of the people of North Carolina. It
makes sense in an evenly divided 50-50 State.
Apparently, because far-right extremists in this country aren't
convinced that they can win elections on their own or even hold the
United States House of Representatives on their own, they decided to
rip away three seats from the people of North Carolina through extreme
partisan gerrymandering.
It is interesting. I hadn't fully thought about that because we are
still counting votes, but as Representative Nickel indicated, Democrats
are on their way to perhaps 215 seats. In the 119th Congress, when
every single vote is counted in California, House Republicans will have
220 seats. By the way, that is the smallest majority of any incoming
party, Democratic or Republican, since before the Great Depression.
What mandate? It is an evenly divided House of Representatives. The
people of this country want us to work together, which we are willing
to do, and find bipartisan common ground on any issue whenever and
wherever possible to make life better for the American people and
deliver real results for hardworking American taxpayers.
{time} 1145
At the same period of time, we will push back against far-right
extremism whenever necessary, but it is interesting that this so-called
overwhelming mandate wouldn't have even yielded a majority in the House
of Representatives if it wasn't for the extreme partisan gerrymandering
that took place in the great State of North Carolina.
I thank Representative Nickel for raising this issue because it
should shape how we proceed in the next Congress of finding bipartisan,
common ground together to get things done because there is no mandate
to enact far-right extremist policies in the United States House of
Representatives or, by the way, anywhere in this country. That is the
reality of this most recent election.
I thank Representative Nickel for his leadership, his service to the
people of the great State of North Carolina, to the Congress, and to
the country. I know that the great Representative from North Carolina
is not finished in his public-service journey, and we look forward to
the best being yet to come.
Mr. NICKEL. Madam Speaker, my colleagues heard it here. In my 2 years
in Congress, I have voted 19 times for Hakeem Jeffries for Speaker of
the House. I had very much hoped to be able to once more vote for him
for Speaker of the House. Unfortunately, partisan gerrymandering has
robbed the voters of that choice, and I did not run for reelection.
We have an incredibly important issue here before us in the U.S.
House of Representatives.
Going back to North Carolina and how we got to this point in our
State, the North Carolina Supreme Court, in an incredibly rare
procedural rule, decided to rehear a case that had already been
decided. The only reason they decided to rehear the case was because
the election changed the composition on the court. It was unprecedented
and the rule is very rarely used.
The dissenting opinion by Justice Michael Morgan charged the majority
with improper motivations and willful blindness. Speaking to their
motivation, the dissent wrote that ``the five justices which constitute
the majority here have emboldened themselves to infuse partisan
politics brazenly into the outcome of the present case. . . . ''
Madam Speaker, that was an absolutely terrible ruling, giving
Republican extremists in North Carolina's gerrymandered legislature the
ability to draw any maps they chose and the North Carolina Supreme
Court did nothing there.
There is so much more work to do, but the North Carolina General
Assembly Republicans carved up North Carolina's 13th District.
As you can see here, this is the current map that our rubber-stamped
supreme court allowed that is now sending 71 percent of the seats in a
50-50 State to Republicans. It would have been almost 79 percent if Don
Davis hadn't won in a Trump district by just a little bit.
This is a 10-to-4 delegation, you can see. You can see North
Carolina's 13th District which is not connected by any real road or
actual way to get there, but only by the colors of a map going all the
way around the triangle in an obvious partisan gerrymander.
This is not a fair map, Madam Speaker. This is a map where
politicians
[[Page H6175]]
have chosen their voters instead of voters choosing their politicians,
giving Republicans three extra seats in the 119th Congress that they
would not have had had there been fair maps.
Again, while the votes are still being counted, I believe we will end
up at 220 Republicans and 215 Democrats. Had we been allowed to have
fair maps in North Carolina, I would have returned, Kathy Manning would
have returned, Jeff Jackson would have returned, and we would have had
a 7-7 delegation, and we would be preparing for the legislative agenda
under Speaker Hakeem Jeffries. Those three seats are very likely the
difference in the control of Congress.
This was a rare, mid-decade redraw of our maps. It is wrong, and we
need to do something about it.
Madam Speaker, as we see, this is another example of extreme partisan
gerrymandering, but it happens all over the country. If we look to
Texas, Florida, Tennessee, and again, North Carolina, these are extreme
gerrymanders, legislators handpicking their own voters and
predetermining the outcome of our elections before they even happen.
Madam Speaker, we have gotten this down to a science. It is with
surgical precision that maps can be drawn. It is known that if a map is
drawn a certain way, the outcome can be guaranteed if you take it out
of the middle range of a 45 percent to 55 percent district, which I
will get into in a little bit, and I have a chart for that.
I will talk about folks in North Carolina who have experienced a
continuous redrawing of their maps. We are the most litigated State in
the country. We continue to spend more and more money fighting over
maps instead of allowing nonpartisan, independent redistricting, which
is the goal of the FAIR MAPS Act. Folks have seen a change of
representation 4 times in the last 10 years in many districts because
of Republican gerrymandering in the North Carolina General Assembly.
Madam Speaker, courts threw out electoral maps drawn by the
legislature three times in the past decade due to gerrymandering. That
was in 2016, 2019, and 2021.
Again, North Carolina is a 50-50 State. It is not fair to force a 10-
to-4 map on the voters. Again, this very easily could have been 11-3.
If Don Davis hadn't run such a tough campaign, that would be 79 percent
of the seats for Republicans, again, in a 50-50 State.
My colleagues heard before that North Carolina in the last election
gave its electoral college votes to Donald Trump, but it gave Democrats
votes for the North Carolina Supreme Court, for superintendent of
public instruction, for secretary of state, for attorney general, for
Lieutenant Governor, and for Governor. We are a true 50-50 State. We
deserve to have fair maps.
These maps that you see here target African-American voters with
surgical precision to diminish their voting power. They are clearly
unconstitutional. We have lawsuits going on right now.
We have seen success in southern States on racial gerrymandering. I
expect and hope that this map will be changed because it is not a
constitutional map. It is not a fair map.
Those lawsuits are ongoing. We are going to fight for fair maps. We
are going to continue fighting to end partisan gerrymandering and to
protect the right to vote for every single North Carolinian.
Madam Speaker, partisan gerrymandering has been a tool used by
politicians in nearly every State to manipulate the outcomes of
elections. It doesn't matter who is doing it. Partisan gerrymandering
is wrong whether it is Democrats doing it or it is Republicans doing
it. It is bad for our democracy. It is bad for the United States
Congress.
There are some States--not many--where Democrats gerrymander with
surgical precision. It leads to hyper-partisanship, increased
polarization, and it disenfranchises voters. We need to end the
practice. We need to put in place nonpartisan and independent
redistricting commissions.
We can do that by removing the ability of politicians to draw lines
in their favor. We can restore fairness and ensure that voters are the
ones choosing their politicians and not the other way around.
Now, I have in front of us here a chart with 140 dots. We have 14
congressional districts in North Carolina. We are an even, 50-50 State,
50 percent Democrats, 50 percent Republicans in terms of this map right
here.
If you have the power to decide how you draw the maps, you can do it
any way you want. We can easily see here a map where you give four of
the blue dots to Democrats, six to Republicans. It is a pretty safe
Republican seat. You could it again here, again, 6 to 4. Again, you do
it here with this one here, and then I have got this one here, and then
this one here, 6 to 4. Then you want to draw a Democratic seat, packing
and cracking, you select two of the red dots, eight of the blue dots.
If you do this over and over, you get a map that would send 4
Democrats, 10 Republicans to the U.S. Congress. Again, six and four;
six and four; six and four. Again, you can do it over and over, and the
outcome will be the same. If you have the ability to do it, you can
predetermine the outcome.
Here is the next chart.
Again, you can see right here, this is what it looks like, 4 to 10,
and this last 1 here could have gone either way.
How does that work?
What does that look like when you draw a map a certain way?
From what we have seen here, this is what North Carolina looks like
in the congressional elections that just happened. You see 10 safe
Republican seats outside of this middle competitive zone that I want to
talk about, 3 Democratic seats accomplished through packing as many
Democrats as possible into 3 congressional districts.
Then another one that was a 50-50 seat, this is Don Davis. It is a
district that Donald Trump won, we believe. The votes are still being
finalized. This is a 50-50 seat. It could have gone either way. This
allows 71 percent of the seats for Republicans. Could have been 79
percent if Don Davis hadn't won by just a little bit.
When you put a district, Madam Speaker, outside of this middle
competitive range, we kind of call it the 45-to-55 percent range, but
to be even more precise, we have 46.5 to 53.5 percent. That is the
range of districts where anybody has a decent chance of flipping a seat
from red to blue or from blue to red.
When you draw it outside of this range, outside of 55 percent, the
chances are minuscule. You are looking at less than 1 percent that any
of these seats could ever flip. It may happen in a tsunami year, or
maybe with a candidate who does something absolutely horrific, but when
you draw a map and you put it in this area, you know that it is
virtually impossible to flip.
Again, here, you see three Democratic seats, incredibly safe. They
put as many Democrats as possible. This is the place. This is the place
right here, Madam Speaker, where we need to have many, many more
congressional districts.
I sent a survey to all of my constituents to ask how they felt about
gerrymandering. I got over 1,300 answers. Here are some of the quotes
from my constituents, and here is what they said: I feel like my vote
doesn't count the way both sides use the maps.
Another constituent said: I haven't moved in 20 years but have been
in 3 or 4 different congressional districts.
Another constituent said: It is hard to have a relationship when they
keep changing because the district keeps being changed.
Another constituent said: Since moving to North Carolina in 2015, I
believe we have been in at least three different congressional
districts. It has become frustrating and confusing.
Another constituent said: I don't feel like I am accurately
represented.
Another said: Having my district number change is confusing.
Another said: Makes me feel distrustful in my Representatives.
Another said: Not sure what is going on. We need transparency.
Another said: It decreases trust that Representatives have citizens
as their top priority.
Another said: It adds to the dirty politics stereotype.
Another said: Political races have become very noncompetitive.
They certainly have if you are outside of that range.
Another said: Once elected, they only care what their party wants.
[[Page H6176]]
Lastly, another said: It makes me feel like my vote doesn't matter
and reduces a desire to engage with elected officials since I don't
feel like my Representatives truly represent me.
They used words including ``distrust,'' ``confusion,''
``unrepresented,'' and ``extreme'' over and over and over, as you see
the word cloud of responses from my constituents who wrote in about
their thoughts on this.
Madam Speaker, I think it is important, as we are talking about North
Carolina, to explain where we are as a State. In order to change our
constitution to require fair maps, there is no way that citizens can
put something on the ballot. The only way to get something on the
ballot is to have 60 percent of the statehouse and the State senate
agree to put an initiative on the ballot.
When you have extreme partisan gerrymandering, gerrymandering
legislative districts, as well as congressional districts, it is
virtually impossible to ever allow Democrats to get to 60 percent under
these partisan gerrymandered maps, so we can't put anything on the
ballot.
The only choice we have is the supreme court. Democrats in North
Carolina have shown repeatedly they are willing to draw fair maps, to
push for the fact that our State constitution says we should have free
and fair elections. Right now, it is two Democrats to five Republicans
on the North Carolina Supreme Court. We just elected Justice Allison
Riggs by just a few hundred votes recently, but she won.
The next election, we will have one seat on the ballot. The next
election after that, there will be three seats on the ballot. If
Democrats win three out of four elections for supreme court over the
next two election cycles, we might be able to see fair maps in 2030,
but we need action in Congress. Congress can do this immediately.
With a simple majority in the House, simple majority in the Senate,
signed by the President, we can get the FAIR MAPS Act entered into law
to make sure that we have nonpartisan, independent redistricting in
every State in the country with all States playing by the same rules.
We don't have to worry about the North Carolina Supreme Court. We don't
have to worry about the U.S. Supreme Court, if we just do the job that
voters sent us here to do.
The majority of voters across the country support nonpartisan,
independent redistricting. If we put it to a ballot initiative in the
U.S., to the entire country, the vast majority would support
nonpartisan, independent redistricting. When you do it in every State,
you see it on the ballot, it succeeds, and you get fair maps.
{time} 1200
One thing I will point out about North Carolina, the Governor of our
State doesn't have the ability to veto legislative maps. They took that
power away. We have one of the weaker Governors in the country.
Right now in North Carolina, we see legislative Republicans trying to
weaken Governor-elect Josh Stein even more as they pass legislation to
take away his powers. Unfortunately, the Governor can't veto
legislative maps, congressional maps, so we need action in Congress.
The U.S. Congress can fix partisan gerrymandering in North Carolina
and in every State in the country, and that is what my bill, the FAIR
MAPS Act does.
Madam Speaker, the FAIR MAPS Act would help to make independent
redistricting commissions a reality in every State. That means every
State playing by the same rules. Specifically, I will mention Texas, I
will mention Florida, Ohio, Tennessee, North Carolina. These are States
where we see extreme partisan gerrymanders.
The number of truly competitive districts in Congress is declining.
It leads to more polarization and less willingness to work across the
aisle and to do what is right for our Nation. It is why we are on track
to be the least productive Congress in our Nation's history. There is
no incentive to work across the aisle.
As I stand here, it is so incredibly easy to reach across the aisle.
It is not a large space. You can put your hand across and shake hands
and actually do the right thing for folks.
What does that mean? What would the FAIR MAPS Act do for North
Carolina? What would it do for the country? We analyzed this and we
looked at the numbers. Right now, anybody will say we have less than 40
seats out of 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives that are
competitive. The other seats, the other 90 percent of the seats,
guaranteed to go to whoever wins the Democratic primary or Republican
primary, almost without exception.
We took this issue to the experts at Duke University, and we said, if
the FAIR MAPS Act were to become law, what would that do for this
Chamber? What would it do for the people who serve here in Congress?
They said, if the FAIR MAPS Act were law in every State including
Texas, Illinois, Tennessee, and Florida, and Texas had to draw fair
maps, we would double the number of competitive seats. We would go from
40 to 80 where the voters are the ones picking their Representatives,
where more Members of Congress would be forced to do the right thing by
working across the aisle to get things done.
Madam Speaker, there are many amazing Members here who do what is
right. They love their country, whether Democrats or Republicans in
safe districts, but they are not incentivized to do it. If voters don't
like a Member's position on ending gun violence, they really don't have
a way to make their voice heard because the districts are
overwhelmingly Democrat, overwhelmingly Republican. It is a big deal.
My bill, the FAIR MAPS Act, would double the number of competitive
seats in the U.S. Congress.
Again, we see constituents all over the country who are
gerrymandered, finding they have new Members every election, and they
don't know who represents them. In the last election, again, we saw
what happened in North Carolina: 4 Democrats, 10 Republicans.
When we take politicians out of the process completely, we had better
results. We had more fair elections. We have competition to get here.
It has been tried and it has worked successfully in other States.
We see great examples in Arizona, in Colorado where independent,
nonpartisan redistricting commissions had been able to draw fair maps,
and you have responsive districts that change with the will of the
people.
The voters are the ones who should be deciding who serves in this
body, not partisan Democrats or partisan Republicans trying to add an
abnormal number of Members to these States.
We need more legislative action. We need to make it easier, not
harder, for eligible voters to make their voice heard. In Congress,
there is a lot we can do to make it easier for people to vote and to
participate in our democracy.
I helped introduce the North Carolina Redistricting Transparency and
Accountability Act, a bill that would establish transparency and
accountability requirements for congressional redistricting processes.
I am proud to support the John Lewis Voting Rights Act and the
Freedom to Vote Act, which would end partisan gerrymandering, expand
voting by mail, protect early voting, help get big money out of our
elections, combat dark money, support election integrity, and make
additional reforms to improve ballot access.
As I stand here, I am, again, brought to the very simple conclusion:
We are on track to be the least productive Congress in our Nation's
history because there is no incentive for Democrats and Republicans to
work together because there are so few competitive districts. Ending
partisan gerrymandering would do so much to change this body.
Again, 90 percent of the Members here are in safe seats. All they are
focused on is winning their Democratic primary or their Republican
primary. It is statistically guaranteed, if you are going to bet money
on it, it is a great bet that if you are in a safe Democratic seat,
safe Republican seat, you are going to be able to win. Hyper-
partisanship has been fueled by gerrymandering. It creates a
legislative body that struggles to address even the most pressing
issues facing Americans.
In this Congress, we have only been able to do must-pass bills: debt
ceiling, continuing resolution. We passed one budget. We were able to
stand with our allies in Ukraine and Israel and Taiwan, but that is
pretty much it.
I was proud of some of the work that we have done. I worked on FIT21,
one of the biggest nonmust-pass bills we
[[Page H6177]]
passed to finally provide a regulatory structure for digital assets. I
organized 71 Democrats to vote with my Republican colleagues. That was
one example of working across the aisle to get something done, but
there have been so few examples of that in this Congress. There have
been so few real accomplishments because of partisan gerrymandering and
because of a Republican majority that is unable to get their act
together, to do the work that they need to do.
Again, we have seen chaos and confusion in this body, and it has been
fueled by partisan gerrymandering. It is contributing directly to the
dysfunction by creating these safe seats where politicians are only
focused on their primary elections and not the general election.
It is increasingly filled with Members here who are more beholden to
party leaders than to the diverse needs of their constituents and their
communities. Congress is failing to deliver because it is no longer
designed to reflect the will of the people; it is designed to protect
incumbents and perpetuate partisanship.
If we want Congress to actually get things done, we need to fix this
broken system. The FAIR MAPS Act is one way to start. By implementing
independent, nonpartisan redistricting commissions, we can bring
fairness and competition back to our elections so that the best ideas
win at the ballot box, the best people serve in the U.S. Congress as we
will send more responsive Members to Congress to do what they are
supposed to do to work for the American people.
Madam Speaker, we are doing our best to understand how partisan
gerrymandering has affected this election, but one statistic that I
think is incredibly important is the number of split districts in the
U.S. Congress.
What is a split district? A split district is a district that elects
a Member of Congress of one party and a President of the other party.
Let's look over the course of our history here in the United States.
Split districts used to be very common. We would have voters picking
Democrats and Republicans for different offices up and down the ballot,
but those folks in the center have continued to decline, in part,
because of partisan gerrymandering and the extremism it has brought to
the U.S. Congress.
In 1984, there were 190 Members of this body who came to Washington
in districts that elected a President of one party and a Member of
Congress of the other. In this election, it is districts that voted for
Kamala Harris for President and a Republican for the House, or
districts that voted for a Democrat for Congress and Donald Trump for
President.
In 1984, 190 split ticket districts. In 2004, 20 years later, we are
down to just 58 split ticket districts in the U.S. House of
Representatives. My election, 2022, just 23 Members of Congress from
split ticket districts, 17 Republicans, 6 Democrats, that is what we
have in the 118th Congress.
With this last election, we are down to what looks to be--again,
votes are still being counted--just 13 Members of the U.S. House of
Representatives from split ticket districts. I know for sure that is
Don Bacon and Brian Fitzpatrick. Those are two districts where voters
sent a Republican to Congress, but Kamala Harris as their choice for
the White House and then Democratic districts where the rest, including
Members like Jared Golden, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, Tom Suozzi, Don
Davis, and others, but just 13.
We had 190 40 years ago down to 13 now. If you draw a congressional
district that Kamala Harris won or that Donald Trump won, you can be
almost certain that they are going to send a Democrat or a Republican
to the U.S. House of Representatives. That is why gerrymandering is
wrong. That is why we have to fix it. The time for action is now. This
is the most pressing need of this Congress.
Madam Speaker, as I close out my time, I will leave this body with
this incredibly important thought. You heard it from leader Hakeem
Jeffries. We are very likely to see a Congress decided by North
Carolina partisan gerrymandering, a mid-decade redraw of our maps.
This wasn't a 10-year draw. This is something that partisan
Republicans in our legislature did sending 10 Republicans, 4 Democrats,
a net gain of 3 for Republicans, and those 3 seats were not even close.
Gerrymandering will very likely decide control of the next U.S. House
of Representatives, 220-215. That is what it looks like, and those
three seats in North Carolina are very likely the difference.
Madam Speaker, thanks, again, for letting me take the time to be here
on this incredibly important discussion. While my name won't be on the
ballot and wasn't on the ballot this year, I am not giving up or going
out quietly in the fight for fair maps and to end partisan
gerrymandering.
I firmly believe that voters should choose their politicians;
politicians should not choose their voters. Right now, democracy is on
the line and North Carolina and all the other States in this country
are worth fighting for to get this right, to end partisan
gerrymandering.
We have got a bill to do that, the FAIR MAPS Act, which I have talked
about at length. It just takes a majority of the House, majority of the
Senate, and we would have districts that allow folks to have a real
choice at the ballot box in November.
I continue to fight with every ounce of my energy for fair maps and
to end partisan gerrymandering and to protect the right to vote for
every single North Carolinian.
This is the biggest issue for this Congress. It is one that we need
to address and it would bring balance to the House. It would allow for
more bipartisan legislation. It would require folks to know that if you
don't work across the aisle, if you don't reach your hand across that
aisle to the opposing party, the voters are going to send you home
because it is a district that could go either way.
That is what we need more of, that is what my bill would do, and that
is why I am going to continue pushing to end partisan gerrymandering,
so we don't have States that look like North Carolina.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair would ask Members to observe
proper decorum in the use of exhibits in debate.
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