Missouri Republicans on the verge of gutting gerrymandering reform

https://news.yahoo.com/missouri-republicans-verge-gutting-gerrymandering-100004085.html

Sam Levine
,The Guardian•May 11, 2020

In the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, Missouri Republicans are seeking to undo a recent effort to make electoral districts in the state legislature more fair.

Lawmakers are trying to gut a referendum voters embraced in 2018 that sought to prevent excessive gerrymandering, a process of manipulating electoral maps that Republicans have used to gain advantages throughout the country this decade. The 2018 measure, approved by 62% of Missouri voters, put a non-partisan demographer in charge of drawing districts, limiting partisan influence on the process. It also makes partisan fairness one of the top criteria the mapmaker must follow. It would likely weaken Republican control of the legislature, according to an Associated Press analysis.

Now, Republicans are on the verge of sending a new ballot proposal to voters that would undo those protections. Their plan would eliminate the non-partisan demographer and return redistricting power to committees nominated by the political parties and selected by the governor. It makes partisan fairness the least important criteria to follow when drawing maps, instead prioritizing keeping communities compact. The proposal also makes it harder to get a gerrymandered map struck down in court.

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If Republicans succeed, advocates worry it could serve as a model for weakening gerrymandering reform elsewhere. Voters in Michigan, Colorado and Utah all used ballot measures to pass gerrymandering reform in 2018.

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