# Gerrymandering California

The governor and legislature of California are trying to gerrymander the U.S. House of Representatives districts in the state. For background, see [this article on 2025–2026 United States redistricting](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025%E2%80%932026_United_States_redistricting). See [GradientDissenter's strategic analysis](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/YuKktzP9yGbdrd7ry/gradientdissenter-s-shortform?commentId=ANuzGfdNYfMHgWbTA). Below is my own attempt at an analysis, pretty similar to GradientDissenter's.

# Gerrymandering would hinder Trump from gathering power.

If the Republican party maintains majorities in both houses after the midterm elections, Trump will continue to consolidate power easily. A Republican-majority congress could pass laws that give Trump more power to do the things that he wants.

On the other hand, if the Democrats get a majority in the House, the Republicans will have to negotiate with them, or wait for an emergency to get them on board; or else Trump will have to work within existing laws, or break the law. Reducing Trump's set of options will slow him down, which limits the amount of damage he can do.

# If both sides gerrymander, democracy suffers.

Gerrymandering is bad for the same reasons democracy is good.

When a state legislature redraws congressional districts to favor a particlar party, it takes agency away from the voters and gives it to the state legislators. More precisely, this attenuates the causal chain (voter → U.S. representative) and strengthens the chain (voter → CA legislator → district boundaries → U.S. representative). This decreases the legitimacy of the U.S. House of Representatives, because democratic oversight is less direct, and state politicians have more power over who is elected.

In particular, gerrymandering now would somewhat delegitimize the midterm election from the perspective of disenfranchised Republican voters in formerly red districts. I can't predict what concrete effects this would have, but I could maybe imagine, for example, the Trump administration ordering federal agents or soldiers in California to jail Democratic representatives, if those agents felt those representatives really weren't legitimate.

I can think of a couple other ways gerrymandering is bad for democracy: Gerrymandering decreases the number of votes required to support an atrocity. (Theoretically, a party could get a majority in the House with 25% of the popular vote.) And maybe gerrymandering tends to give parties larger majorities in the House.

# There are weak norms against gerrymandering.

[Most states don't have an independent redistricting commission.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_congressional_redistricting_methods,_post-2020_census.svg) Instead, districts are usually drawn directly by the legislature, so we should expect lots of gerrymandering.

Indeed, see [wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerrymandering_in_the_United_States#Examples_of_gerrymandered_U.S._districts) for examples of gerrymandered districts from recent history. The [Gerrymandering Project](https://gerrymander.princeton.edu/) tries to measure the partisan bias of all the districts in the country; but it doesn't tell us whether those biases were achieved on purpose or by accident.

There are federal laws that limit gerrymandering to some extent. See [here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_United_States_redistricting_cycle#Litigation) for some recent lawsuits.

# The escalation

California's gerrymandering plan is narrowly scoped to retaliate against Texas's:

* It adds 5 Democratic representatives, just as Texas added 5 Republican representatives.
* It only touches congressional districts, not the districts for the state legislature.
* And it will only last until/through 2030, when the independent redistricting commission will be allowed to redraw the districts.

Other red states gerrymandered along with Texas. Virginia (blue) might gerrymander in retaliation to North Carolina (red). California's gerrymandering might inspire the Trump administration to try to get more red states to gerrymander. But keep in mind that California is the biggest state, and not all states are willing or able to do this.

# Other concerns

I'll briefly mention some weaker considerations I read or thought of, before synthesizing the above considerations. 

Gerrymandering would be unfair to red voters in newly-blue districts. Specifically, it would reduce the power of their vote and give it to their blue neighbors. It wouldn't affect their influence over policies in their district, which is determined by the state government. And their lessened influence over federal policies is balanced by the red gerrymandering in Texas. If I had to pinpoint the unfairness here, it would be in the intersection of partisan and regional politics, like the flavor of [pork](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pork_barrel). That doesn't seem that important to me.

Some proponents of California's gerrymandering plan say the proposed maps are good. But the properties of the maps aren't what's strategically or ethically important here. What's important is that the maps were chosen in order to produce 5 more Democratic representatives.

Instead of gerrymandering, the California Democratic Party could try to field conservative candidates in red districts, thus providing representatives that voters like and who aren't beholden to the Trump administration. Maybe they should do this, but it's an independent decision from whether to gerrymander.

# Synthesis

From the standpoint of the Democratic side, if the 2026 election doesn't go well, there might not be a meaningful election in 2028. That makes it matter a lot, but doesn't by itself tell us the right thing to do.

From the standpoint of individual citizens, gerrymandering is a somewhat common political tool that also damages the institutions that protect citizens. It's better if no one gerrymanders.

Gerrymandering is considered bad, but some amount of it happens.

From the standpoint of the citizens of one state among many, a good thing to do is to gerrymander less than the other states — California's independent redistricting commission has been a good example of this.

From the standpoint of citizens supporting one political party, the thing to do is to reward good districting with good districting, and punish gerrymandering with gerrymandering, in such a way that the equilibrium (if the other party behaved similarly) is no gerrymandering. California's proposal is a good example of this.