Sunday, October 22, 2023

Cheating to win elections: Wisconsin GOP defends the use of cracking and packing in drawing legislative districts (Brown County edition)

 
The 89th Assembly District includes portions of Marinette, Oconto and Brown counties.  The Brown County portion appears to tongue its way into the west side of Green Bay.

The egregious Elijah Behnke won a special election in April 2021 and quickly proceeded to make a fool of himself.  In November 2022, he defeated his Democratic challenger by 33 percentage points.  Voters here seem to have a death wish.

Headline:  Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, 8/11/2023
Map:  Wisconsin State Legislature  (boxes added)

Somehow, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Tyler Katzenberger can write an article about legislative district without mentioning 'gerrymandering', 'packing', and 'cracking'.  

It's called journalistic malpractice.

The UW Applied Population Lab defines 'cracking' as 
drawing districts in such a way as to divide a concentration of specific types of voters across several districts such that they are a minority in each one, with practically no hope of achieving representation in any of the districts. This practice also helps make districts less competitive.
Th UW Applied Population Lab defines 'packing' as 
the practice of drawing particular districts in such a way as to ensure that another party's candidate wins that seat by a tremendous margin. Although the opposing party is all but guaranteed the seat, packing makes surrounding districts less competitive, and thus tips the balance of power in the legislative body overall toward the ruling party.

                  x

Meet the leaders of the packing and cracking brigade!


Wouldn't you rather have this diverse group in the majority?  They support fair maps.
 


Other posts in the series:

See also:  Wisconsin Gerrymandering Spotlight, round 2

See also:  Spotlight on Wisconsin gerrymandering

No comments:

Post a Comment