Even the editors of the conservative Wall Street Journal are placing blame for the redistricting arms race at President Donald Trump's feet.
On Thursday, the Journallamented that both Texas Republicans and California Democrats are on track to pass new maps that aim to shut the opposing party out of power until at least the 2030 U.S. Census. And while they acknowledged that leaders of both parties were complicit, the paper assigned the bulk of the blame to Trump himself.
"President Trump started this latest gerrymander brawl by urging Lone Star Republicans to redraw their Congressional map to mitigate potential GOP losses in next year’s midterm elections," the Journal's editors wrote. "His Justice Department also threatened to challenge the state’s existing map as an unconstitutional racial gerrymander."
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According to the Journal, while Trump has leaned on Republican-controlled legislatures in deep-red states like Texas and Florida to redraw maps to give the GOP an adherent advantage, Democrats have taken their cause to the courts. The paper cited examples from North Carolina and Pennsylvania that allowed Democrats to pick up two seats and three seats, respectively during Trump's first term.
Even though the conservative paper's editors decried Democrats' efforts to gerrymander maps to their favor in blue states, it also acknowledged the 5-4 decision the Supreme Court's conservative majority handed down in the 2019 Rucho v. Common Cause case, in which the Court ruled that redistricting was a matter for individual states, rather than the federal judiciary. And the paper made it clear that it preferred allowing legislators to draw maps as opposed to judges.
"It is at least more democratic for elected lawmakers to redraw maps than politically unaccountable judges," the editorial read. "Politicians reduce political competition when they choose their voters, but it’s nothing new. Patrick Henry tried to gerrymander James Madison out of a Congressional seat in 1789."
"Gerrymanders reduce political competition, and they’re getting worse over time," the paper continued. "Congress could set limits on the practice, but incumbents want safer seats. Unless voters rebel, it will continue. At least the political cynicism is no longer hiding behind false flags."
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Click here to read the Wall Street Journal's full editorial (subscription required).