Even if Democrats recruit great candidates, raise gobs of money and run smart campaigns, they face an uphill fight to retake control of the U.S. House in this year’s congressional elections, regardless of the political climate in November.
The reason? Republican strategists across the country spent years developing a plan to take advantage of the 2010 census, first by winning key state legislatures and then redrawing House districts to tilt the playing field in their favor. In states like Ohio, Michigan and North Carolina, Republicans were able to shape congressional maps to pack as many Democratic voters as possible into the fewest House districts. The process, called gerrymandering, left fertile ground elsewhere in each state to spread Republican voters among more districts, increasing the GOP’ s chances of winning more seats.
Geography helped, too, in some states. Democratic voters are more likely to live in densely populated urban areas, making it easier to pack them into fewer districts.
The first payoff came in 2012, when Republicans kept control of the House despite Democratic support that swept President Barack Obama to a second term. The next payoff is likely to come this fall.
Gerrymandering has a long history in the United States, pursued enthusiastically by both Democrats and Republicans. But the GOP’s success at it this decade has been historic: In 2012, Republicans achieved a 33seat majority in the House, even though GOP candidates as a group got 1.4 million fewer votes than their Democratic opponents.
