iowa and lowenthal california. it also included a constitutional and appellate law attorney to explain why more gerrymandering cases are being challenged in the court system. posted by common cause, this is an hour. >> i want to figure panelists. every 10 years, every legislative district united states must be redrawn.

from the u.s. representative to state legislators and city councils. our districts to ensure they have equal population so that all americans are legal representation at every level of government area unfortunately, this process is for political verses. it's in a way that subverts the basic foundation of our representative democracy. in most states, clear conflict of interest exists in which legislators on their own districts are personal after maps for personal or political vantage. the uses of his ago software and big data to preordained outcome of elections for entire decade. in a process that should be prioritized -- her ties legal representation and changing their graphics, it's instead become one more front in ongoing person war in which american voters are the ultimate victims. the people are fighting back. citizen activists and volunteers

are putting their energies into fundamental democracy reform. in michigan, and after the start of a single facebook post asking who wanted to help gerrymandering has welcomed voters, not politicians. it's a democracy force that recently submitted more than four to 50,000 teachers to put an initiative on the 2018 ballot. they want to create an independent citizens commission. in ohio, decades of efficacy paid off when reform was passed that voters approved in 2015. have put aators referendum on the 8 -- 2018 ballot to change how redistricting is done. otherare a number of states that have ballot initiatives underway including colorado, oklahoma, missouri, and you talk. in the courts, eight states still have pending legislation -- litigation.

in the consolidated cases of common cause in league of women , the federal court struck down a congressional map is unconstitutional. court will hear the appeal later this year. hear at days, they will challenge to maryland's democratic map. the justices surprised court watchers when they agreed to hear the case. it appears the supreme court could be poised for historic action the summer on partisan gerrymandering. for a republican gerrymandering and a chalice to a democratic gerrymander of the same time.

it's now matching significant importance today. all of a sudden we see ourselves thrown at the forefront in the center of a public site -- public fight to fundamentally protect our prostitution rights. i want to welcome you think all of our speakers for coming today. i would like to start a welcoming congressman lowenthal. he is serving his third term for california's 47 congressional district. stand for fair redistricting in the five his own party. he signed briefs in both partisan gerrymandering cases in the supreme court. rep. lowenthal: thank you. this is on. high, i'm alan lowenthal and

want to thank everyone for coming. colleagues will soon here collision problem. i want to thank you minutes and shia. i know rod will be here. when i decide to work with common cause and others. we have done now in congress to admit this briefs. he was on the last one, which brief on the gill v. whitford case. it was really of arizona case. a little background. i was elected to the california state legislature in 1990 -- 1998. i arrived in 1999.

process ofugh the the 2001 redistricting in california. , i'm a democrat. today,nia in 2001, like is overwhelmingly a democratic state. controlership had the over the drawing of the boundaries. that was the background. when i went through that redistricting, it was a terribly offensive process. wasn't only sub out in the public hearings but late at night when the boundaries were andg drawn, he would sit those that that word -- that were drawing the maps would say, what do you need? i found the process totally offensive. a process that reinforced the self interests and the

protection of incumbents rather than redistricting which the communities of interest in and thataccountability members of the accountable to their districts. 2002, when we began to work after the 2001 redistricting, california had 34 democrats in the congressional delegation and 19 republicans. 34 out of 53 members. i then began to work with kathy fonda in common cause in california to see what we could do. the founder of a small group of renegades called the bipartisan caucus. there are four or five democrats and four or five republicans.

to looknsibility was at, how to we take redistricting out of the hands of the elected officials and give it back to the people? hard at looking at models. they brought in the arizona redistricting commission and asked them what worked and what didn't work. then we began to work on it model as ourzona model. --nging things to make it updating it and making sure we could do with the issues around litigation and the problems arizona had in terms of litigation. i want to get into that specifically. it was a positive process. the ballotthing on in california, you had to go to the initiative process or get

two thirds of the legislature to do it. time 2004 came, i was elected to the state senate and continued my work on redistricting. 2004 and 2000 and -- 2005, the democratic leadership said, well, we really like this concept of not doing it here. we are the party in power. why should you as a democrat give up the power. my main thing was, if you trust the people and we have fair , districts that reflect communities of interest and not the gerrymandering that goes on to protect incumbents, we will gain seats. we will not lose seats. a fundamental this crust of the public when you engage in gerrymandering. the same don't trust the public.

you need the legislature and others to draw the district. we got that out by a two thirds vote out of the state senate. everyone in california was just shocked. the bill never came up. they got buried never to be found again. that's when common cause and others took this model and worked with the governor. we will try to put it on the ballot. that's what happened. we got it on the ballot. it passed. 1970's, 1960's to the

whenever the legislature couldn't deal with redistricting after it sent -- census, it'd that having the courts decide twice. got punted to the courts could legislature couldn't get their act together. the other years, with the democrats were in control, they did the redistricting and i was part of that last one in 2001. say, we were told you can't go independent, you will lose seats. the worst thing the party in power can do is give up their own power. no, that's not what this place is about. thatabout having people are representative's other districts and listen to the people in their districts and make it as competitive as they can.

follow the law. we almost follow the law. as i mentioned when i first started, in the middle of the night, everything got turned around. everyone started protecting themselves. i did that. people voted on them in california. in our state, democrats picked up. we went from 34 seats 239 seats and the democrats are the ones who fought against the redistricting. i kept saying, if we represent the people, don't be frightened. we will do just fine. we did that in our first independent redistricting commission. 2011 for the 2012 election.

, thatas interesting was was the first time that the lines, we were not suited. people said we didn't do we wanted but it was a fair process. it was an open process. we had no litigation at all. we tried to introduce something similar to this. let the people draw the lines. and looked around for who could i find that could be supportive of these issues. i began to identify a number of people. amicus brief -- that's when my colleagues stepped up and helps to take the lead. brief.amicus

now we are seeing what was a non-sexy issue. all of a sudden we are seeing now, this has come to the forefront. whether it's the wisconsin case, the maryland case, the north carolina case, all in one way or time.r it's an exciting they said you can't do this. what is partisanship or how do you measure excessive partisanship. that is what they are now struggling with. think this is totally appropriate that we are meeting here today.

this is now before the courts. thisce ginsburg has said is the most important case that the supreme court will be hearing this year. this is the key cases that we will be deciding. yesterday,t heard also pennsylvania, upheld the state court. again that we have an opportunity in 2020 to move the ball forward. to have for the first time fair re-districts. districts and membership that reflects the members. rather than the needs of the political party.

i think that's very important. i am pleased to be here. . think is a very exciting time thank you for coming and let's get on with it. let's work on these cases. educate ourselves. most numerous of congress don't understand. this is low on their priority list. them ands to educate say this is not low on the process. that's why we are here. thank you. and thank you for joining us. i can give you a few minutes or move on to the next speaker. rep. blum: yeah, i'm ready to jump in. >> i'm sure we can give you more

than two minutes. thank you for joining us congressman blum. serving his second term representing i was first congressional district. lowenthal, he took a stand against partisan gerrymandering when he signed an amicus brief opposing the public and gerrymandering in wisconsin. his home state of iowa uses a unique model for nonpartisan redistricting that common cause supports. thank you. rep. blum: thank you for having me. gerrymandering is a serious subject. jokes.ed gerrymandering there weren't any. this must be serious stuff. i did find on this. back in 1812, the governor of assachusetts gerrymandered district in one of the a picture ofinted

the gerrymandered district and they said this looks like a salamander. this made it all over the state of massachusetts. someone said no, that's not a salamander that's a gerrymandering is the governor's last name is jerry. if you are nothing else from what i say, now you know where gerrymandering comes from. and i'm from the first district of iowa. iowa is not gerrymandered and let me tell you briefly about my district. 2008, former president barack obama won my district by 18 points. in 2012 you wanted by 14 points. president trump in 2016 wanted by three points. it's not a gerrymandered district. i think if we had more district that could do that, back ago both her actions, it would be a much different government today. braley.cessor was bruce

he's a democrat. his predecessor was a republican. i'm a republican. this is the type of district that is always in play. it's always a target. i think this is the way that if countrystrict in the were as competitive, i think we would have better representative because you would have to listen to your constituents and you would have to listen to the voters. i always jokingly say my office there is not an easy vote. i have to sit there and look at all the different perspectives on every single vote almost. especially the big ones. a lot of my colleagues, that's not the case. they know they are inset seats.

frustration inf the country. not just this year. people are frustrated that house,s, especially the never changes power. arenow it does but people so frustrated that the congressional approval rating is a percent or 12%. you would think wow, the entire house is a changeover. nope. 95% of the seats are safe. it's always the same 40 seats in districts like mine that are competitive and become targets. i'd be lying to you if i said it was fun being a target. it does make you a better .epresentative i live in washington dc and go back to my district every weekend. i love iowa and i love my home i love my family but i need to be there. i need to be out of the district working and listening.

subdistrict. but with the government be like. people are concerned, rightfully so, about not working together. in my district we talk about bipartisanship a lot. if every district was competitive in this country, we would have bipartisanship. we are forced to work with of the parties. we often say that the democrat party does not have a corner on great ideas and neither does my party. let sit down and work together. i'm sure i'm way over. the me tell you how i would does it. a computer. they make sure the districts are contiguous and don't look like a set of headphones. none of that goes on in iowa.

it does not look at where incumbents live. does not care at all. it does not look at party registration. it just does it. geographically. and by making sure that we have for resented seats. seven or 50,000 people. people.00 that's the number of people in each district. in our legislature can vote it down or up an amendment. amended.t there is no politics that come into it. the computer will make another map and voted up or voted down. it takes politics out of it the way it's supposed to be. districts infour the state of iowa are very competitive. my district is more democrat than the one south of may.

david young is a very competitive district as well. it makes us better representatives. this.involved in i'm a career businessman i always want to clean up the way things are done here. i've always stood against gerrymandering. governor schwarzenegger called me up a few months ago and asked you to sign onto the biggest brief and we read through in our office. absolutely i want to get involved in this. whether my party wants me to or not. it's the right thing to do. gerrymandering is bad government and makes for bad representation. districts, the party is out of power, their participation tends to be low.

beir voter turnout tends to low. because they know it doesn't matter. that's not representative government. whether democrat or republican, this goes both ways. i signed under the brief because this is not -- there's not a single person out here that can say this is good. no one would say it's a good thing. it's not a good thing. i think iowa is a model. a model of how to do this correctly. i have way over talked that that's why i'm glad to be involved in i was standing against gerrymandering for as long as it takes. can get rid of it and get partisan politics out of it. thank you so much for having me. tonow i would like to shift

him it bond her aunt. emmet bonderant . he argued common cause the rich show in north carolina. .-- v, on cause the rucho. you give us the lay of the land of litigation? >> let me try to do so briefly. many states do not have initiatives a referendum but depend on state legislatures. usually requires a two thirds or three fourths vote of the legislature before they are it to the submit people. legislators being self-interested are not about to

give away any reform. malapportioned district all of the country for 200 years to the court stepped in. cases.re now three one will be argued and is pending. case is awisconsin challenge to the apportionment of the wisconsin legislature. a three-judge court and 82-1 2-1 opinion, a that cases argued october. it will be decide between now and june. the second cases in maryland. it is unusual test case.

brought by a plaintiff who , steve to be here today shapiro. challenging a democratic gerrymander of a single congressional district in maryland. it was one that was historically republican for the last 20 years , the incumbent won by 20% or so of the vote. meeting the one man, one vote standard, this legislature simply moved 10,000 voters out of the district, which was overpopulated, two adjacent districts which are underpopulated. instead they took a meat ax and cut it in half and moved in 330,000 new people into the district. and moved 320,000 out of the district. converted from a district which had a 12 point republican registration advantage to an 11 point democratic registration

.dvantage to no one's great surprise, the republican incumbent was defeated and a democrat was eled reelected ever since. the third case was in north carolina where i'm currently involved. common cause was the lead plaintiff and challenged a portion of 13 congressional districts in north carolina. when the republicans took over the north carolina general assembly, they gerrymandered districts in north carolina, which is a 50-50 state, from one in which there was a 7-6 democratic majority to a 10-3 republican majority by gerrymandering districts. gerrymanderedthey on racial quota. those were held unconstitutional by the supreme court.

in 2016, the district court ordered the districts redraw in. the republican legislature adopted, still under control of republicans, adopted written criteria, the objective of which to preserve the partisan advantage they had created in 2011. they specifically set in the written criteria that this would be a partisan gerrymandering. to userected map drawers political data, meaning how districts voted in 20 statewide elections between 2008 and 2012. they did that. in january, a three-judge district court and a 204 page opinion which i commend to your reading, found this was a

deliberate partisan violated not that one, but four provisions of the constitution. it violated the first amendment. the court found effectively what this was was viewpoint discrimination. under established supreme court law, neither states nor the federal government can demonstrate they can discriminate between people based on their political beliefs , their political viewpoints about any particular issue. secondly, the court ruled violated the equal protection clause. interestingly, in all three state and none of the amicus briefs have argued that this partisan gerrymandering is legitimate. that it serves any democratic

purpose or any legitimate state interest. traditionally, under supreme court law, statutes that discriminate have to serve a state interest, at least a legitimate state interest, and no one has yet argued there is anything legitimate about this. say, like the biblical quote that the poor shall always be with us, that the politics are a process you have got to live with. you don't. the third ground on which the court declared the plan unconstitutional applies only to congressional districts. that is under the elections clause, which you remember is the clause in which the constitution delegates to the state the power to determine the time, places, and manner of elections of members of the house of representatives. two casese court in in the 90's and early 2000's

ruled that the elections clause means only that the state has the power to adopt procedural rules for the governance of congressional elections. this does not include the power to "dictate collect oral outcomes, to favor or disfavor a class of candidates." that is established supreme court law. what does a partisan gerrymandering do? dictate collect oral outcomes. a partisan gerrymandered will dictate whether a democrat or a republican will be elected in the general election. every congressional district that has been gerrymandered, what does it do but favor or disfavor a classic candidates? -- a class of candidates? in summit favors democrats and others, democrats -- republicans.

stop doing it. use neutral principles. sometimes argued, well, they comply with traditional principles. these districts are more compact. they don't look as gerrymandered as the original eldritch gary gerrymandered. with modern computers it is very easy to draw compact districts, contiguous districts, districts ,hat don't divide counties municipalities, and still screw one political party or the other. to show how successful it is, the clinical report reported the 2016 elections were the least competitive congressional elections since they have been keeping records since the mid-1980's. congressional district out of 435 were classified as competitive, which meant by their definition, they were

decided within a margin of plus or -2%. in my own state of georgia, of 180 house seats, 80% did not have a general election opponent. why? it was not worth the filing fee for the other party to run a candidate in that district. of 14 congressional districts in 2016, only five of the 14 did not have a general election opponent. why? it was not worth the filing fee. if elections are to be democratic, justice ginsburg, with no dissent, has said partisan gerrymandering is incompatible with democratic principles. the court has the opportunity in these three cases to remedy it and remedy it decisively,

asarly, and effectively just they did in the one person one vote cases in 1964. 1964, you had congressional districts that had five times as many people or 10 times as many people as others. state legislative districts that were even worse than that. the court, even though that had been a 200 your practice, stepped in and said, one person one vote means equally effective votes, not merely the formal right to cast a ballot. in partisan gerrymandering, the same principle applies. we are optimistic the court will, this term or next, in one or all of the three cases, complete the reapportionment revolution by ending partisan gerrymandering.

as they did with malapportioned meant 50 years ago. finally, micah is the director of common cause -- what isa, who has going on in pennsylvania, to build reform. >> let me share a number i hope you would catch within your memory banks. 208,200 70 -- 329,208,270. usir constitution has given -- through the exercise of redistricting, allowing our country, state, and local units of polities to organize

according to population is not historical context, a meaningful way to help current issues find real-time solutions. we are caught in because some of the past, busiest with bias and negligence. redistricting is right now, which helps us live at life liberty and the pursuit of happiness. redistricting is the window to improve democracy in the future. if redistricting is our future an amazing democracy, gerrymandering is the antithesis of a productive democracy. for our form of government to operate as intended, each and every american voter must have the same free and equal opportunity to select his or her representative. remember that number from the beginning? since 2012, approximately 329 million votes have been cast during general elections hoping

to exercise that opportunity of selecting a congressional representative. as we have seen with numerous state and federal lawsuits, many of these boats, even some of the votes cast by those of us in -- our districts were damaged by gerrymandering. the damage was harmful, but that damage that citizens, organizations, and coalitions to fight for our country. we realized redistricting needed to be affected is like the votes. -- protected just like the votes. my home state found districts who would not allow votes to be wasted any longer. causembers of common pennsylvania sought not only to have voices heard, but establish

a map where all voters of pennsylvania would feel that their voice and their vote mattered. this case weaved its way through the court rooms and the words were placed in legal briefs. we realized there were those who were not in those boardrooms who wanted to be heard as well. in pennsylvania, organizations come together under initiatives such as the keystone campaign, where we gathered 30 statewide organizations, coalition work, and citizen efforts with groups like power, which is an interface organization, work diligently to ensure that residents became aware of the disease, the villain known as gerrymandering. people from philadelphia to ee rie learned how democracy was being attacked.

dr. martin luther king jr. once said, our lives begin to end when we become silent about the things that matter. in pennsylvania as well as other states, when it comes to ,edistricting, gerrymandering attacking our ability to select representatives, silence is no longer the order of the day. it is important and it matters. citizens care, and residents want to know that when they cast their vote, it counts. there is no longer silence on this issue. there are initiatives in places like maryland where the have gathered over 400,000 signatures. in indiana to have created a committee to work on how to create fairer maps. in georgia, a common cause has actually organized a two or -- tour called gerrymandering 101. there is no longer silence on this issue. it is time to address who should do the map drawing in the best

interest of their this and equality -- fairness and equality. stop allowing elected officials choose voters and have voters choose elected officials. time to follow states such as california where nonpolitical citizens draw and approve the final maps. there is no longer silence on this issue. cause, the common league of women voters, naacp, and local organizations are enabling people to see how this connectsredistricting with kitchen table issues such as jobs, education, and housing. redistricting is being promoted in the heart of every current and future voter. we are witnessing a moment in democracy with these cases. for a not only optimistic

decision that allows our hero to end the villainous activity of gerrymandering, but we are also optimistic of expanding our engaging citizenry who realizes that activism and working together can truly help improve our democracy. thank you for this opportunity to speak up for all of those who really do want to end gerrymandering and have fair maps. >> thank you to all of our speakers. i'm going to take a couple questions. if you could raise your hand, please. take questions from reporters first, please identify your affiliation. well you're gathering your thoughts, i have a couple of questions. the first is directed to congressman lowenthal. you touched on this earlier. what role does congress or can congress play in the

redistricting process? do you believe we are going to see reform at the state level, or do you think we will get to a point where we can have a national standard develop? all of thehal: above. i think for the foreseeable future we will see the changes occurring at the state level. and that's really where i think the foreseeable future is. it was ahat fascinating process when we first started to do the arizona to get congress involved in the amicus brief. , what commoned cause and others decided, is to have an equal number of democrats and republicans sign on to the amicus brief. i will be honest, it was difficult getting an: number.

-- an equal number. we had 10 democrats and 10 republicans on the amicus brief. it's up a lot of work to get those 20, who are really the champions in the congress for educating ourselves. bill andi introduced a others have also, there have been a number of bills. my bill was to say, let the people draw the lines. ofwas based upon the model taking the drawing of districts out of the hands, as you pointed out, of elected officials and giving it to the people to decide. having a fair process. the importance of independent read it does -- redistricting is fairness. was we did in california have an equal number of republicans, democrats, and

with the chair of the commission being an independent, not democrat or republican, and that any vote -- any map had to have votes from all three buckets. turns out we didn't even need that. the commission came together, bonded, figured out what they had to do, and i do believe the -- with every member of the commission voted for the maps that ended up coming up. to answer your question, i am not optimistic that congress will drive this trait. i think he will be driven by the states and the courts. will be driven by the states of the courts -- and the courts. it is hard enough when we have a

consensus to see the congress act. congress has to be pushed. the nice thing about what has taken place in independent redistricting or ending gerrymandering is that the pressure is coming from the bottom up. that will lead to great change. up until now, the decisions about how legislatures work on redistricting was always a top-down model. both parties would send their people to the states. they would draw the maps. they would determine what those maps would look like. when you had people who already have power, you say, now you are going to have to give it up, it is very difficult. i believe it will be the courts now that will say, determine, and then it will be from the states themselves. then i think congress will act. certain it will come right now from the congress.

>> i think there are 16 states that have some type of activity around redistricting form -- reform. mike was saying that was happening in georgia to develop reform. we have a number of states with ballot initiatives. , aside from the maryland case and the wisconsin case, are there any other redistricting cases you think could make their way to the supreme court? two cases andse the north carolina cases, the court is going to have before it the opportunity and those three cases essentially exhaust the legal theories anybody has come up with yet, clearly smarter people than we are who may come up with other theory if those cases fail

particularly in the north carolina case, that is the most thorough opinion written in the fields. it covers for constitutional grounds -- four constitutional grounds. reversed, thes supreme court will be saying, they cannot do anything about this. it's fair game. which means if you think the legislatures have been bad here to four, it will be open season. there will be no constitutional restraints. it will be more extreme than you have ever seen. on the other hand, if the court affirms the north carolina case, -- for rules favorably in the maryland case, which is a first amendment case, maryland and north carolina have that in common, if it rules be

first amendment is a form of viewpoints from nation or retaliation against voters based their beliefs, the lines are very clear, which is don't do it. don't pay attention to voting history. don't pay attention to registration. except in delimited area of compliance of the voting rights race.ou can't consider why should you be able to discriminate against democrats, republicans, green party or independents? the court has got it squarely teed up. there are no outs. there is no way to punt on first down and kick to somebody else who is going to have to decide. i'm optimistic out of these three cases on whatever theories

are put forward, the court is going to come up with a solution as they did in the reapportionment cases. i had the privilege of litigating in those cases. talk about sending a child to do a man's work. [laughter] 1962, the courts to be only aat this was political question, that the courts could not become involved. over a. of two years -- over a period of two years, that reversed. court said this practice, which existed since the founding of the constitution of unequal districts had to end. iny drew a very clear line what is called the one person one vote rule. congressional districts, for example, have to be equal in population. not sort of equal.

it's not horseshoes. because the federal policies trump any state policies. thatis a real opportunity none of us foresaw for the court to step in and really reform american democracy. not whiff onwill three pitches. , thisant to add onto that is a historic moment. in the past, the courts have looked at racial gerrymandering. now we are seeing the courts taking a look at what we just heard, the actual drawing of partisan -- two advantage one party over the other. those issues are in all three of these cases. the court, which has been reluctant to deal with these,

because the have felt this is a very difficult thing to deal with. it's easier to see the racial gerrymandering. now the courts, as they did with one person one vote, is fully addressing the partisanship. this is unheard of. that's why what we are doing today is so important for us to learn about these cases. >> thank you. is there a question from the audience? >> i just have one last question before we wrap up. in be states, things happening in the states. what do people need to do to address the issue of gerrymandering? to be able to

reach out to good government reform groups like common cause and find out how to get engaged. a number of people from presidential elections bounced off of their sofas and decided to find ways to get engaged. in pennsylvania, gerrymandering that roset sexy thing from the grassroots for people to rally around. because it does connect to so many different things, it remains engaging and so nice for people to say, listen, i want my votes to be protected. i want to feel that when i go to vote, it is not wasted. i want to feel it has been protected and that my voice and my vote count. i think people have to find a good government organizations. i also think in this age of

activism, people are starting to begin to do it right in their own living rooms. organizing within your communities, at your churches, mosques, and synagogues, fighting people who are interested in helping to embrace democracy and begin to talk about the issues, educate one another, and find ways of engagement. >> i want to thank everyone, thank our panelists for joining us. if you want to learn more, visit our website, commoncause.org. you can read about what's happening in the states and stay up to date with litigation. thank you again. [applause] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

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