coming up shortly, white house press secretary jen psaki will be briefing reporters. when that gets underway, we'll have live coverage here on c-span3. if you want to talk about the redistricting process, there's no better person to bring on to talk about it than the man whose twitter handle

is @redistrict. david wasserman, states begin this once every ten-year process. we're already behind. explain how covid and delays caused in the census is making us delayed in the redistricting process. >> yeah, john. this redistricting is off to a slow start, in part, because washington has been consumed by a lot of other events. but especially because of covid-related census delays. and the census missed its statutory deadline for reporting the reapportionment counts, essentially the population totals in every state which it was supposed to do by december 31st. now it's looking like we may not have that data until the end of april. that means that we won't know for sure which states are gaining and losing seats until that time. but states have to wait even longer to start the process, because to actually draw districts of equal population, the states have to have detailed census data. and that is not expected until

the end of july. the full big file that is required to look at how much population is in each and every census block. so, that leaves a compressed timetable, because, keep in mind, a number of states have fairly early primaries and filing deadlines. for example, texas and illinois have typically had filing deadlines in december of the year preceding the election. and this time it's likely that we'll see a number of states have to push back filing dates for the midterm elections or primary dates even. and with a compressed timetable, keep in mind a lot of state legislatures who are tasked with this process are not in session at the time the census data is likely to be released. it's possible that the clock could run out in a number of states, and courts could take over the process, which is an awkward position for courts, but

it's done from time to time. >> you mentioned the courts when it comes to redistricting there's always this concern about gerrymandering. what have the courts decided about gerrymandering? is it legal? >> so, the supreme court in 2019 issued a landmark ruling that gerrymandering was not justiciable, which means that the supreme court said that partisan claims of gerrymandering could not be brought in federal courts. and there is still of course the voting rights act. this is the first redistricting cycle since the shelby v. holder decision in 2013 that invalidated some sections of the voting rights act. what that means is that the federal preclearance process, in other words, back in the last several decades, states that were covered by section 4 of the vra had to submit their redistricting plans to the justice department to be signed

off if they were not discriminatory. this time around, that's not in effect. but you still do have section 2 of the vra, which does protect majority/minority districts in most cases. and so there are going to be a lot of lawsuits filed over maps. i expect a number of vra claims to be filed this cycle with regard to the role of race in redistricting. but as far as partisan gerrymandering goes, that's something that has increasingly been litigated at the state level under state constitution. so, in 2018, democrats filed suit in pennsylvania to overturn the republican-drawn congressional map there based on a claim that the partisan gerrymandering republicans had engaged and violated the state constitution. so the state supreme court there threw out the map. there are a number of other states that have implemented

commissions to try and make this process less partisan. i'm sure we can get into that. >> and we can throughout this 45 minutes the washington journal with david wasserman of the political report, and it works great when you call in and ask your questions as well. so, republicans 202-748-8000. go ahead, start calling in. david wasserman, when it comes to redistricting, there is definite winners and losers when it comes to the states around the country. take us through as part of your recent report on this, the projected 2021 reapportionment map. and i'll show it to viewers as you talk us through it. >> there are going to be a number of states that gain or lose districts. and the big winners we expect to be texas gaining three seats. and florida gaining two seats. again, these are projections. we'll find out for sure in april. there are five other states that are slated to gain one state

each. oregon, montana, colorado, and arizona. there are ten states projected to lose one seat each. those are mostly in the upper midwest, minnesota, michigan, illinois, pennsylvania, ohio, new york, west virginia, rhode island. alabama is a state that's on the bubble. it could lose a district, the same with california. so, if you had run the 2020 presidential election under those projections, because, keep in mind, electoral votes are also pegged to how many house seats each state get, joe biden would've won with four fewer electoral votes than he did in the 306-232 scenario we just saw. so this is a slight shift of power towards republican-leaning states, not overwhelmingly so. but those big gainers, texas and florida are both states

republicans control in the process. they also control north carolina, a state that is gaining a seat. and keeping in mind how narrow the house majority is right now at 222 to 212 essentially with one race in upstate new york that's still undecided, that means that republicans would likely only need to gain five seats to win back the house, and that narrow margin really makes this a high-stakes process, because republicans could conceivably gain all the seats they need to bring the house to a tie in texas and florida alone. and that's even before you get to factors like the larger political environment in 2022 and the candidates that the parties recruit. >> let's pause there and take some phone calls. fort fierce, florida, independent. go ahead. >> good morning, dave. nice talking with you. i'd like to bring a little bit of reasoning into it, logical reasoning into our conversation here about all the money being

put out by the government. the first thing is how far can we have to go to win? we've just run out of money in the government. and maybe are you willing to monetize our debt? are we willing to do that? and then when we get to the point where we're using minimum wage, the people that hurt is far more than the people that it helps because it's inflation. >> on the issues of debt and minimum wage, stick around we're going to come back to that minimum wage discussion. certainly one that's a topic for this week. but for right now we're focusing on redistricting in this country, the process that is getting underway. i want to focus the calls on that topic specifically as we have the man who is the go-to source for that, dave wasserman of the cook political report. we'll go to james in ohio.

james, go ahead. >> yeah. so, i want to go back to putting the wall around the capitol. they raised hell about trump putting the wall down to keep the illegals out. now they want to put a wall up here to keep the illegals in. don't make sense to me. >> david wasserman on, that topic, you're a man who's worked around capitol hill for a long time. what's your take on a new security or permanent security barrier around the capitol? >> it's unfortunate, and at the same time it makes sense. the callers -- >> i have quite a few things at the top. but then we will take plenty of questions. i wanted to take a moment at the top of our briefing today to note that on this day 21 years ago, president clinton announced the naming of the white house briefing room for former press secretary james brady. brady, as many of you are probably aware, was severely wounded in the 1981

assassination attempt on president