Redistricting and Competition in Congressional Elections

Key Points
• Based on presidential voting patterns, a much larger proportion of U.S. House districts strongly favor one party and a much smaller proportion are closely divided than 50 years ago.
• However, gerrymandering is not the major reason for this trend. Partisan polarization has increased dramatically in U.S. states and counties, whose boundaries have not changed.
• Moreover, despite the growing partisan divide evident in presidential voting, the competitiveness of House elections has changed very little over the past 5 decades because the personal advantage of incumbency has declined sharply during this period. CONTINUED

Alan I. Abramowitz (Emory), Sabato’s Crystal Ball

Partisan lean of U.S. House districts based on presidential vote, 1972-2020


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