Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

Top Stories

Bid launched to bring independence to Nevada political mapmaking – in 2023

Nevada congressional districts

Currently, two of Nevada's four congressional districts are routinely competitive between Republicans and Democrats.

mapchart.net

A long quest has formally begun to add battleground Nevada to the roster of states where the election districts are drawn by non-politicians.

Advocates for ending partisan gerrymandering nationwide filed a proposed state constitutional amendment on Monday with officials in Carson City. It would create an independent commission to draw both state legislative and congressional districts — with a mandate they be geographically compact, give minorities a fair shot at representation and be as "politically competitive" between the major parties as possible.

The earliest that could happen is four years from now, however. That's because, even if advocates gather the necessary 98,000 signatures by June to put the measure on next November's ballot, and even if it succeeds then, a second statewide vote reaffirming the first one is required in 2022 before the new panel could get to work.


As a result, the four U.S. House districts and all the state legislative districts will next be refashioned by the state Legislature. It looks highly likely to remain solidly Democratic after the 2020 election and the release of new census data, and Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak will be in the middle of his term.

Fourteen states currently use independent commissions for drawing state legislative lines and nine states are on course to use such panels for the next congressional redistricting. The drive for more such bodies has gained steam since the Supreme Court ruled in June that partisan gerrymandering disputes were outside the purview of federal courts

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Nevada's current maps were imposed by a panel of judges in 2011 because a politically divided state government couldn't reach agreement. The result is that two of the four congressional districts are routinely competitive between Republicans and Democrats, as are a decent number of the 21 state Senate and 42 state House seats.

In large measure because of its rapidly growing Latino population, the state has been trending blue in recent years, and 2016 marked the first time in four decades when the presidential winner failed to carry the state. But Republicans still make very close contests out of most statewide elections.

The Nevada proposal, with includes strict rules to keep people with ties to partisan politics off the commission, is a coordinated effort among the League of Women Voters of Nevada, the progressive Brennan Center for Justice and RepresentUs, which bills itself the nation's biggest grassroots democracy reform group.

Read More

Women voting
Edmond Dantès

Voters are no less anxious about elections now than they were in 2020

Reid-Vanas is a clinical therapist at, and founder of, Rocky Mountain Counseling Collective.

New research by Rocky Mountain Counseling Collective reveals that American voters are already experiencing more election anxiety in 2024 than they did on Election Day 2020 (typically the day of highest election anxiety). The findings come from analyzing the Household Pulse Survey, a collaboration between the Census Bureau and federal agencies.

At the height of the 2020 election, just over half (51 percent) of surveyed Americans reported experiencing anxiety.

Keep ReadingShow less
‘Stories about the way the nation is organized are dividing us’: A conversation with Richard Slotkin

‘Stories about the way the nation is organized are dividing us’: A conversation with Richard Slotkin

Berman is a distinguished fellow of practice at The Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, co-editor of Vital City, and co-author of "Gradual: The Case for Incremental Change in a Radical Age." This is the 11th in a series of interviews titled "The Polarization Project."

Is the United States on the brink of a civil war? Few people are better placed to answer that question than historian Richard Slotkin.

Slotkin, an emeritus professor at Wesleyan University, has devoted his career to the study of violence and American history. In an award-winning trilogy of books (“Regeneration Through Violence,” “The Fatal Environment,” and “Gunfighter Nation”), Slotkin explained how the myth of the American frontier — the idea that violence against a racialized other must be employed to conquer the wilderness and make way for civilization — has been used to justify government action across the history of the United States.

Keep ReadingShow less
Tim Walz speaking at a rally

The Dignity Index scored politicians, such as Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz, on their language.

Peter Zay/Anadolu via Getty Images

Bipartisan citizens panel issues new Dignity Index scores

UNITE, a nonprofit created to ease the country's political divisions, on Sept. 20 released the second round of scores from its national citizen's panel analyzing political speech. The latest results offer support for founder Tim Shriver's idea of a political "dignity strategy."

"When our political parties use the contempt strategy — demonizing their opponents to energize their supporters — it has an unintended effect," said Shriver, who founded UNITE in 2018. "It turns away the voters they need to win. The candidate that can treat the other side with dignity has a better chance of winning the swing voters who may decide this election."

Keep ReadingShow less
"Swing state" sign under a cutout of Pennsylvania
gguy44/Getty Images

Election Overtime project prepares Pennsylvania media for Nov. 5

A new set of complementary tools designed to support accurate reporting of contested elections will be unveiled by the Election Reformers Network and other election law experts on Wednesday.

The Election Overtime project will provide journalists covering Pennsylvania’s 2024 general election with media briefings by election specialists; guides for reporting on election transparency, verification processes and judicial procedures; and an extensive speakers bureau. The briefing is designed for journalists but is open to the public. Register now.

Keep ReadingShow less