After taking control of a House redistricting process from a bipartisan committee, the ruling Democrats in the State Legislature have made a bid for their proposed map, which would reportedly have little impact on district lines in the city.
Faced with the options of either tinkering with the panel’s proposals or aggressively reconfiguring the map to their own advantage and risk increasing the odds of a court rejecting their proposed changes, the party ended up finding a middle ground.
Democrats did not seek to push more progressive Brooklyn neighborhoods into the more conservative district of Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis in Staten Island, and even in the suburbs of Long Island and Hudson Valley, the changes made were minimal. Additionally, most of Western New York remained unaffected by the redrawn map.
The redraw would still carry possible implications for the future of the House in 2024, and it’s still unclear whether the Democrats’ approach could protect the proposal from a potential challenge in court.
However, David Wasserman, an election expert with the Cook Political Report, says the map is a “mild to moderate gerrymander.”
“This is not an aggressive play by Democrats,” Wasserman said. “These are changes on the margins.”
The blueprint could present a more leftward skew to some competitive districts, including those of Rep.-elect Tom Suozzi, a Long Island Democrat; Reps. Pat Ryan, a Hudson Valley Democrat; and Brandon Williams, a central New York Republican.
Although overall the changes have been “pretty modest”, reported Jacob Rubashskin, an analyst at the nonpartisan newsletter Inside Elections.
In December, Democrats won a key court’s approval to reopen the redistricting process and throw out the current map, and on Monday, they rejected district lines that were approved this month by the state’s Independent Redistricting Commission that were similar to the current borders.
The GOP, which fought first to keep the current lines in place and then to approve the compromise, has claimed Democrats are pursuing partisan tricks to work through a map that could help Democratic candidates.
Gov. Hochul, who has defended the party’s lawmakers’ decision to reject the original bipartisan plan of the map, will decide whether or not to authorize the proposal in the coming days.
