RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — A replacement map for North Carolina’s congressional districts was finalized Friday, with its lines redrawn to address alleged extreme partisan bias and endangering reelection prospects for two Republicans next year.
The GOP-controlled General Assembly enacted boundaries for 2020 elections with a party-line vote in the state Senate.
The map, which had already cleared the state House on Thursday, was reconfigured because state judges last month blocked lines drawn in 2016 from being used next year.
The judges said evidence of partisan gerrymandering — Republicans carving up districts to maximize the number of winning districts favoring their party — made it likely that map violated the state constitution. So any remap was expected to narrow the 10-3 seat margin Republicans hold in the state’s U.S. House delegation.
Republicans offered maps that would place GOP Reps. Mark Walker of Greensboro and George Holding of Raleigh in districts that clearly favor Democratic candidates. Both of their current Republican-leaning districts — a mix of urban, suburban and rural areas — would be consolidated into more Democratic urban counties.
Neither Walker — the former chairman of the Republican Study Committee — nor Holding have said yet whether they’ll run anyway.
The prospect of two seats flipping parties next year would help national Democrats seeking to keep control of the U.S. House after the November 2020 elections. Some Democrats argue an 8-5 seat split favoring Republicans isn’t enough — saying partisan gerrymanders still exist in the new map that will keep races uncompetitive.
“There are circumstances under which it could be fair,” Senate Minority Leader Dan Blue of Raleigh, but “you need competition in these districts.”...
