Elections & Voting
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Fifty-eight of North Carolina’s state house seats and 18 of North Carolina’s state senate seats will lack representation from both major political parties in this November’s elections. Among North Carolina’s 5.2 million active voters, this means that 2.4 million or 47% will have no choice between major political parties in their state house elections. In the state senate election, 1.8 million or 35% will not be able to choose between Republican and Democrat. Looking at…
Based on the recent candidate filings, we can classify North Carolina’s 120 state house districts into one of three types: Democratic candidate(s) only, Republican candidate(s) only, and at least one candidate from both major political parties. (Although some districts do have Libertarian candidates on the ballot, this analysis focuses only on candidates from the two major political parties.) Sixty-two of the state’s 120 house seats, or 52%, have at least one Republican and one Democrat…
Based on the recent candidate filings, we can classify North Carolina’s 50 state senate districts into one of three types: Democratic candidate(s) only, Republican candidate(s) only, and at least one candidate from both major political parties. (Although some districts do have Libertarian candidates on the ballot, this analysis focuses only on candidates from the two major political parties.) Thirty-two of the state’s 50 senate seats, or 64%, have at least one Republican and one Democrat…
Following the December 21st, 2015, candidate filing deadline, the lack of competition for state House and Senate seats was the subject of many headlines. In many districts, only a single candidate is running, effectively guaranteeing them re-election. In others, the only candidates that filed are from the same party; while voters may have a choice among candidates, the only choice will occur at the primary stage. By the November 2016 general election, the outcome will…
Following the decennial Census, political districts, such as U.S. Congressional Districts and state legislative districts, are reapportioned to states and counties on the basis of population and their boundaries are redrawn in a process called redistricting. Broadly speaking, the goal of redistricting is to make each district as close in population size in possible. While North Carolina’s population growth continues to outpace the nation, this growth is concentrated in the state’s urban areas. Nearly half of the state’s population growth since 2010 has occurred in two counties—Wake and Mecklenburg. Over this same time period, 49 of the state’s 100 counties have lost population. Today’s post explores the implications of these population shifts on the state’s legislative districts.
When discussing redistricting, I’ve heard individuals raise the question, “Why don’t we just let computers draw the lines and be done with it?” And why not? We let computers run so many aspects of our lives, why not this one as well? While computers and GIS software are fundamental to the completion of redistricting tasks, programming the computer to draw the maps requires firmly established criteria. Even with clear criteria, there are thousands of legal…
North Carolina will likely have 14 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives following the post-2020 Census reapportionment process. While we cannot guarantee a 14th seat (no matter how likely), we can guarantee significant changes to the state’s congressional district boundaries during the 2021 redistricting process. North Carolina’s population has grown substantially in the past few decades, and it continues to grow. At the same time, population is increasingly concentrated in urban cores within the…
Based on the 2010 census, North Carolina’s total number of congressional districts remained the same during the reapportionment process—13 House seats. But not every district drawn 10 years earlier that was based on the 2000 Census data grew at the same rate over the decade. There was significant variation in population growth across the state: major metropolitan areas grew rapidly, while other areas experienced slow growth or population declines. North Carolina’s post-2010 redistricting process required…
Every decade, following the release of decennial census data and the reapportionment process, state legislatures and committees redraw district boundaries to account for population changes. This process is called redistricting. As of 2010, there were 43 states with at least two congressional districts, meaning that they must undergo a redistricting process. Two federal guidelines govern redistricting. Both of them are based on demographic data: equal population in each district and the protection of racial/ethnic voting…
States typically benefit from having as much representation in Congress as possible. Each state is guaranteed two Senators, but the number of representatives each state has in the U.S. House of Representatives is based on population size. Representatives are reapportioned to the states every ten years, following the release of population counts from the decennial census. As the number of seats in the House of Representatives is fixed at 435, any change in the number…
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