The 2012 election provided two powerful reminders about the electoral implications of overly-concentrated Democratic voters. First, the Republicans held their U.S. House majority, won in 2010, despite the fact that the Democratic candidates in the 435 House districts received more votes than their Republican opponents. Second, these House results were echoed by Democrat Barack Obama’s defeat of Republican Mitt Romney by nearly four percentage points nationally despite the fact that Obama carried fewer House districts than Romney did (211 to 224 based on the most recent congressional maps).
Whether by dint of the nonpartisan self-segregation of voters or partisan gerrymandering, Democratic voters are distributed inefficiently in U.S. House districts. CONT.
Thomas F. Schaller (U. of Md., Baltimore County), Sabato’s Crystal Ball