Census Data Show Regional Shift in U.S.

Published: December 21, 2010 - New York Times

WASHINGTON — The Census Bureau rearranged the country’s political map on Tuesday, giving more Congressional seats to the South and the West, and taking away from the Northeast and the Midwest, in largely anticipated changes that will have far reaching implications for political life cycles over the next decade.

Bureau officials declared that the United States population had grown to 308,745,538 over the last decade, an increase of about 9.7 percent, close to what the bureau had estimated but the slowest rate of growth since 1940. It was the first result from the 2010 census conducted this year, a finding that will be used to reapportion seats in Congress, based on new state population counts, and, in turn, the Electoral College.

By that new count, Texas will gain four seats, Florida will gain two, while New York and Ohio each lose two. Fourteen other states gained or lost one seat. The gainers included Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, South Carolina and Utah, and the losers included Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts and New Jersey.

“This teaches us how we’ve changed as a country,” said Robert Groves, director of the Census Bureau. “The trend is for a growth in seats for western and southern states.”

The release rang the opening bell on a political season of redistricting, the process of redrawing Congressional districts that has been acrimonious ever since it began in the time of George Washington and James Madison. With a presidential election just two years away, and the Republican sweep of state legislatures in November, the stakes are high.

On the surface, the Republicans would seem to have the advantage. Most of the states winning seats trend Republican, and most of those losing them tend to elect Democrats. What is more, Republicans will be in a strong position to steer the process, with Republican governors outnumbering Democrats 29 to 20, with one independent, come January. Republicans also gained control of at least 18 legislative chambers in the midterms last month.

“Republicans are in the best position since modern redistricting began,” said Tim Storey, an expert on redistricting at the National Conference of State Legislatures.

But population gains in the South and West were driven overwhelmingly by minorities, particularly Hispanics, and the new districts, according to the rules of redistricting, will need to be drawn in places where they live, opening potential advantages for Democrats, who tend to be more popular among minorities.

“Just because Texas is getting four new seats does not mean Republicans will get four new Republicans to Congress,” Mr. Storey said. “You don’t have unfettered ability to redraw new boundaries.”

It is a complex landscape of shifting advantages, and lawyers for both parties are already designing legal strategies in the event of stalemates in state legislatures, where redistricting battles play out. The last census, in 2000, set off litigation in 40 states. The real work of redrawing will begin in February, when the Census Bureau releases detailed geographic counts for each state.

“You either have a deadlock or a compromise plan, and I don’t see a lot of compromise going on these days,” said Gerald Hebert, a lawyer who represents Congressional Democrats. “Parties really prepare for war on this thing.”

The population shifts will also bring significant changes to the map for the 2012 presidential race and the makeup of the Electoral College, with electoral votes being taken away from several states that President Obama carried across the Midwest and the Northeast in 2008.

Mr. Obama won eight of the nine states that are expected to lose seats, including Illinois, New York and Ohio. And of the eight states that were expected to gain one seat or more, five were carried by the Republican nominee, Senator John McCain of Arizona.

While Republicans will see their biggest and most lasting political gains in the House of Representatives, the landscape for the next presidential race will add another layer of complication to Mr. Obama’s re-election campaign. The battleground state of Florida, which he carried in 2008, will become even more critical to his efforts to win a second term and to Republican attempts to defeat him.

But the most lasting political impact for Republicans and Democrats alike is the rise in the influence of Hispanic voters, particularly across Arizona, Nevada and Texas, which underscores the urgency facing both parties in finding new ways to appeal to Hispanics. In future presidential races, Democrats believe they can make inroads into Arizona and Texas, which are traditionally carried by Republicans, particularly if voters speak out against Arizona’s tough immigration law.

The White House will carefully monitor the reapportionment, particularly the adjustments to the Electoral College. Even though the changes are not as big as in other years, given that migration within the country’s borders has slowed during the recession, the shifts in electoral votes could make a difference in a close presidential election.

Ohio, for example, was among the most competitive states in the country in recent presidential campaigns, and has long been seen as a bellwether for the mood of the country. But with the state expected to lose two seats, it remains an open question whether it will remain a critical — or simply a symbolic — swing state.

Commerce Secretary Gary Locke delivered the results of the 23rd United States census to President Obama on Tuesday morning. The president and his advisers have long been anticipating the outcome, particularly with the shifts in the Electoral College, but Robert Gibbs, the press secretary, said he did not believe the census findings represented a dramatic change.

Mr. Obama, under the new apportionment, would lose six electoral votes if he carried the same states that he did in 2008.

“I don’t think that shifting some seats from one area of the country to another necessarily marks a concern that you can’t make a politically potent argument in those new places,” Mr. Gibbs told reporters, signaling the intent by the White House to try and compete in Arizona and, perhaps, Texas.