host: if you want to talk about

the redistricting process, there is no better person to talk about it than david wasserman of the cook political report. states begin this once every tenure process where -- we are already behind. explain how covid and delays to -- delays caused in the senses have delayed this process? guest: redistricting is off to slow start because washington has been consumed by a lot of other events, but especially because of census delays. the census missed its statutory deadline for reporting the reapportionment counts, which it

was supposed to do by december 31. now it is looking like we may not have that data until the end of april. that means we won't know for sure which states are gaining or losing seats until then. but, states have to wait longer to start the process. to draw districts of equal population, the states have to have detailed census data. that is not expected until the end of july. the full big file required to look at how much population is in each and every census block, that leaves a compressed timetable. keep in mind, a number of states have fairly early primary deadlines. texas and illinois have typically had deadlines in december of the year preceding the election. this time, it is likely we will see states pushback filing dates for midterm elections, or

primary dates. with the compressed timetable, a lot of state legislatures tasked with this progress -- process are not in session by the time census data is released. it is possible the clock could run out and courts could take over the process, which is awkward, but it is done from time to time. host: you mentioned courts when it comes to redistricting, there is always concern of gerrymandering. would have the courts decided? is it legal? guest: the supreme court in 2019 issued a landmark ruling that gerrymandering was not -- the supreme court said that federal claims of partisan gerrymandering could not be brought in federal court. there are still of course the voting rights act. this is the first redistricting

cycle since shall be v holder in 2013 that invalidated some sections of the voting rights act, which means the federal preclearance process -- in the last several decades, states that were covered by section four of the voting rights act had to submit redistricting plans to the justice department to be signed off that they were not discriminatory. this time around, that is not in effect. you still do have section two of e.r.a. which desperate -- vra which does protect minority districts. there are going to be a lot of lawsuits filed over maps. i expect a lot of vra claims to be filed with regard to the role of race. as far as partisan gerrymandering goes, that is something that has been increasingly litigated under

state constitutions. in 2018, democrats filed -- in pennsylvania to overturn the republican drawn map-based on a claim that the partisan gerrymandering republicans engaged in violated the state's constitution. the state supreme court there throughout the map aired -- the map. there are a number of other states that have tried to make this process less partisan. host: we can get into that. david wasserman, cook political report. it works great when you call in as well. republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. when it comes to redistricting, there are winners and losers. take us through, as part of your report on this, the projected

2021 reapportionment map. guest: there are going to be a number of states that gain or lose districts. the big winners we expect to be texas, gaining three, florida gaining two. these are projections, we will find out for sure in april. five other slates are -- five other states are slated to gain. those are north carolina, montana, oregon and arizona. there are 10 states -- 10 states we expect to lose the seat. those are mostly in the upper midwest. minnesota, michigan, illinois, pennsylvania, ohio, new york, west virginia, rhode island, alabama is a state that is on the bubble. it could lose a district. same with california. if you had run the 2020 presidential election under those projections, because electoral votes are also pegged

to many house seats, joe biden would have won the election with four fewer electoral votes than he did in the 306-232 scenarios we saw. this is a slight shift of power toward republican leaning states, but not overwhelming. texas and florida are both states republicans control. also north carolina, estate which is gaining a c. -- getting a seat. given how narrow the -- is now, given there is one race in new york still undecided, republicans would still likely needs only gain five seats to win back the house. the narrow margin makes this a high-stakes process. republicans could conceivably gain all of the seats they need to bring the house to a tie in texas and florida alone. that is even before you get to

factors like the larger political environment and the candidates the parties recruit. host: let's take phone calls. william in fort pierce, florida. independent. caller: good morning. i would like to bring a little bit of reasoning -- logical reasoning into the conversation about all of the money being put out by the government. the first thing is, how far do we have to go when we have just run out of money? are you willing to monetize our debt? are we willing to do that? when we get to the point where we are using minimum-wage -- the people that hurt is far more than the people it helps. it is inflation. host: on the issues of debt and minimum-wage commit stick

around. we are going to come back to that. for right now, we are focusing on redistricting. the decennial process that is getting underway. we want to focus calls on that specifically, as we have the man who is the go to source for that, david wasserman. we go to james out of ohio, republican. caller: yes. [indiscernible] don't make sense to me. host: on that topic, you have worked around capitol hill for long time. what is your take on a permanent security barrier around the capitol? guest: it is unfortunate, but it makes sense the caller is from ohio and it is worth noting that

some states have new processes in place for redrawing their maps. ohio is a mystery. it has a newer form past by visitors in the last couple of years -- by voters that implements a new redistricting commission that gears towards drawing more compact maps. for the last decade, republicans have held a 12-4 advantage in the congressional delegation. that has endured through a number of political wave this. -- waves. republican still can stroll -- controlled the state legislatures so if nor the commission nor the legislature can come to an agreement on when the map -- on what the map should look like, the legislature can still draw through simple legislation a new map that would only be in effect for four years until the process starts again.

most states pass maps that are valid for 10 years. we will see whether the commission can come to any kind of bipartisan agreement. if not, ohio could be quite gerrymandered again. host: here's a map of redistricting controlled by state. ohio, one of the states in yellow, that has one of those independent commissions. the red states here, redistricting is controlled in the state legislature, and they are republican. blue states, democrats controlling state legislatures. purple come a split. why are there so many independent commissions in the west? why does it seem like there is regional grouping of had guest: redistricting culture varies by region. the west has been in the vanguard of reform.

it seems like it has been one state that passes a reform that seems to work well in neighboring states adopt similar measures. some has to do with ballot initiative laws. western states have typically had initiatives on the ballot passed by voters. not all commissions are alike. it is important to point out that it can still get quite contentious. in arizona, the five-member redistricting commission ended up passing -- that allowed democrats to get the seats. everything is in the eye of the beholder. the republicans cried foul and said the chairperson of the commission had cited with the

two democratic commissioners to pass a gerrymander that favored democrats. the legislature impeached the chair of the commission and it ended up going to the arizona supreme court. it was a huge, ugly spectacle. there are states where commissions seem to work together well. washington state is an example where the parties on that commission came to agreement. california had a new redistricting commission and that commission was able to, after many meetings, public hearing throughout the state, come to agreement on a congressional and state legislative map. by the ballot initiative that was passed in california, they were prohibited from taken into account partisanship and where incumbents lived when drawing the map. that is the closest to reform that took power out of the hands

of politicians of any of the reform efforts we have seen. host: to george, independent. caller: here in virginia i have been noticing what you have been saying. in virginia our commission is going to have an equal number of democratic and republican legislators as well as eight people -- as well as an equal number of people to redistrict. is that common among these commissions in other states? guest: it is a great question and it is a hybrid approach virginia has taken with the latest constitutional amendment that passed creating a commission. some states that have passed reforms like california, michigan, colorado have prohibited people who have held

office recently from serving on those commissions. other states, it is closely tied to the legislature. new jersey, each legislative leader, majority and minority gets to a point certain number of commissions and the end result is often times they draw maps where certain commissioners are looking at friends who are incumbents in congress. in virginia, like other states with new commissions in place, colorado, michigan, ohio, virginia is less predictable, because we are still in this new experiment where we have to wait and see whether the commission functions well, whether these commissioners can actually work together productively. if not, a map could end up getting drawn by the virginia courts and that is something

that democrats don't like. democrats took over governorship in the last few decades. a number of democratic party strategists still wish they had the authority to redraw maps. host: come back to this map. here is florida on the map about one state that is expected to perhaps gain a seat or two this round of reapportionment. tony writes this about florida. if florida gains seats, i suspect they will come from the largest counties. these are among the bluest in the sate. should they add seats for democrats? guest: you might think so, but the highest growth rates have been the more republican areas in the state. florida is unique. it passed a fair district amendment a couple of years ago,

actually right before the 2012 round, and the goal was to make part of florida statute that maps should be more compact and less gerrymandered and republicans held control last time and they help control this time. 10 years ago they drew a map that heavily favored their own party. florida through the map out in the middle of the last decade and forced the legislature to go back and impose a new map that allowed for democrats to gain a couple of additional seats. this time around, the balance of power on the supreme court in florida has shifted and many worry the republicans could ignore that fair district amendment and drop maps that their hearts desire. but it is complicated, because in florida, republicans picked up a couple seats in the 2020 election. they picked up two seats in the

miami area. i think it is likely republicans will draw the two new seats that florida is awarded for themselves, most likely somewhere in the north central florida region. the villages has experienced some of the highest growth in the country. it is possible the other seat could go to the southwest gulf coast which has also been growing very rapidly. republicans are also going to need to protect and number of their own incumbents. that means they might not be able to get so aggressive. we could beat looking at instead of a 19-8 map, we could be looking at a 19-10 map. host: back to the buckeye state. this is tom. caller: good morning. i think this redistricting is nonsense.

we have too many politicians in washington now, just like when john boehner was congressman. he covered parts of six counties. same way with jim jordan. they are always hollering, illegals, illegals. look at jordan's area, how many illegals are working on those farms? nothing ever said. same way with trump. i used to live in west palm beach and i used to see him every day, he and his buddy. he never had anybody work for him that wasn't illegals. i was stay it is still the same. guest: there was a push by the trump administration before he left office to exclude undocumented immigrants from reapportionment counts. that was a change to long-standing policy at the

census. it was a post by a number of longtime census officials and former officials. essentially the clock ran out on that push by the time the trump administration left office. this was one casualty of the delay of the census counts. now that they are going to be released under the biden administration, it is not going to be -- there is not going to be any exclusion of illegal aliens from the reapportionment counts. that is a piece of good news for states with high populations of undocumented residents, including california, new york, and texas, all might have walked out on representation in urban areas and might've walked out had the policy change come to fruition. host: some very strange looking districts in ohio.

this is the fourth district. it is a story about the worst gerrymandered districts in the country. every state is gerrymandered it says, what is the worst gerrymandered state? guest: look, it is hard to define what the worst gerrymander is. but you have to look to a couple of states as pretty guilty parties here. ohio certainly is a state where republicans went to great lengths to draw districts that bandaged themselves in the last round and that has proven durable. in maryland, democrats drew districts, one of which was the upside down praying mantis that had succeeded in locking a 7-1 advantage for democrats

throughout the last decade. host: is that the third district? guest: yes. host: there it is on the map. guest: it is possible they could try to draw and 8-0 map. in some states you have divided control between the governorship of one party and the legislature of another. and two thirds of the state, the legislature still has primary responsibility for drying districts. in maryland, maryland has a republican governor, larry hogan . they have a vetoproof in both chambers of the legislature. in kentucky, there is a democratic governor republicans have vetoproof majorities. the questionnaire is -- can the minority party peel off if you vote the other side of the legislature who says, i don't feel right about gerrymandering

to this degree. does that lead to a stalemate that pushes the progress to courts at the last minute? we have seen that happen for. that could end up preventing some of the worst excesses of gerrymandering of the time. we can still expect pretty creative maps. host: redistricting is our topics. if you want to call in, (202) 748-8001 republicans. (202) 748-8002 for democrats. caller: i just want to mention that in the south, there is over 50% of the black people in america living in the south. the southern states are some of the most gerrymandered states in the nation.

that is why we have so much gridlock in washington is because no one is interested in anything except for being primary. in the supreme court was wrong not to step in and make gerrymandering more even, because the districts are not competitive. then you have people like marjorie taylor green, and you have senators and congressmen you just can't vote out of office because they are considered, and the even say themselves they are in a state district. it is really a problem and something we really should do something about. i don't have a question. you can look at the map you showed just a minute about and see that the entire south is read on your map -- is red on

your map, and all them are extremely gerrymandered, except for congress. host: you brought up several talk -- topics. guest: the pattern throughout a number of deep south states is at the republicans in charge have more or less drawn one heavily african-american district in each of louisiana, alabama, mississippi, south carolina and preserved republican advantages in the rest of the districts in the state. in alabama, there is a 6-1 republican edge. there have not been any competitive general elections in the last decade. democrats believe african-americans are underrepresented in those states. in alabama, black residents are 28% of the population but they only hold essentially 14% of the state districts. if you do a second african-american majority

district there, that might be more proportional. democrats are planning on suing any number of these states to try and create more african-american majority districts. they have as success in overturning republican drawn maps on racial gerrymandering grounds. in virginia, north carolina, and keep in mind if they hadn't sued to overturn maps in virginia, north carolina, pennsylvania, and florida the last decade, they would not have the slim majority in the house. they would likely be in the minority. every seat matters. we will be waiting to see whether courts are sympathetic to the voting rights act argument in this round of redistricting. host: back to ohio. this is sue. good morning. caller: good morning. host: you are on with david wasserman. caller: the districting they did

in ohio was not right, because they took our main one from canton, ohio and put it up to wadsworth. it is not going according to the original ohio charter. the districts were not to be separated and strung out like they are. guest: part of the reform in ohio is actually geared toward minimizing the number of split counties and trying to make the districts more compact. i don't believe you can split stark county, which i believe is canton, more than once, in this new redistricting regime. a number of democrats worry that it could begin to fight republicans and it is not critical anymore to draw maps that look like abstract art to achieve political gain. a big misconception about

gerrymandering is that it is responsible for all of our political polarization in the house. that is not accurate when you consider that we have seen a vast self sorting of voters on the map over the last few decades. in 1992, only 38% of american voters lived in what we would call landslide counties, those that voted 20 points for either presidential nominee. in 2020, that was 58% of americans. when americans are clustered into heavily red or heavily blue areas, it makes it easier for the map vapors -- map makers drawing those to maximize the number of winnable seats for themselves. that, more so than advances in technology, has made gerrymandering more effective. it is possible that in a number of states, republicans in particular, including in ohio,

to draw maps that look reasonable on paper but end up heavily favoring their own side. host: john in pennsylvania, republican. good morning. you are on with david wasserman. caller: good morning. there are 435 districts in the united states. and each one of my believe, is to represent approximately 750,000 people. when you look at the votes that were cast, i believe -- out of washington received the most. her opponent received maybe 50,000. there were 400,000 votes cast. in some of the districts in california, there is barely 100,000 votes cast by both opponents.

even in kevin mccarthy's case, i don't believe kevin mccarthy that over 100,000 votes or just a little over. is the big difference in these vote counts because there are noncitizens in these districts that are not allowed to vote? is that the count in some of the districts that keeps the vote total down, people that cannot vote? guest: that is absolutely right. there are districts that do include unusually high numbers of undocumented residents. the caller is right about the discrepancy in vote totals crossed -- across district lines. it is believed that the reapportionment counts should be based on the total number of citizens or people eligible to be voters and become voters as opposed to those who are here in

the country illegally. this has been looked at many times by courts, including the supreme court, and the prevailing policy, including all residents, the whole count, is going to be used this time for drawing district lines. host: conrad out of tampa, florida, independent, you are next. caller: good morning first i want to say -- good morning. first, i want to say to my comrades, you can go to the v.a. and get a vaccine at the v.a. we have districts already drawn out. why don't we just use that as the basis of our districts? host: you are thinking zip

codes? guest: -- caller: you are thinking of zip codes. there is an area of land for a certain area. it is there and it is finite. they know how many people are in each zip code. use the zip code as a foundation. so one county and another county, you would likely have voters independent of each other. host: david wasserman. guest: that is the first time i've heard redistricting by zip codes or that would make it difficult for election administrators because they are the ones who handle resorting voters between precincts and election districts based on where the lines are drawn. they do not conform neatly to postal zip codes. for reformers, it is a big part

of their push has been to try and get districts to more reasonably conform to municipal boundaries and cities and counties. a number of state reforms have imposed restrictions on how many splits you can make to those. part of the challenge here is under the prevailing supreme court interpretation, districts at the congressional level have to be equally populist down to one person. in most person -- cases, that requires spitting census blocks to achieve that population equity. host: staying on reformers -- the goal is more geographic and not creating the most competitive districts are more competitive districts in this country so we don't have as many what the caller was complaining about safe democrat or safe republican districts? guest: some state reforms have

prioritized competitiveness as a criteria. the criteria for redistricting can vary from state to state. so in california, california has a partisan approach there the commissioners are not allowed to look at partisan data or even consider it when drawing boundaries. whereas in arizona, colorado, competitiveness is one of the criteria for redrawing boundaries. so colorado, which is gaining a seat, we might expect that is drawn anymore competitive region of colorado, like northern colorado. we will be watching how commissions weigh these from state to state. often times they can come into contention. it is not always possible to draw compact districts that adhere to the current interpretation of the voting rights act. it is not only possible to draw

the majority of districts to be competitive between the two parties. how do you judge competitiveness ? is it based on the most recent presidential election results? often times those that are considered safe or competitive at the beginning of the decade can change in character by the end of the decade. republicans last time drew a lot of districts they thought were safe in suburban areas that then became more competitive by 2018 or 2020. host: to the wolverine state. this is gary, republican. good morning. caller: i heard mr. wasserman say that in this restructuring that i guess it's crazy, but there are undocumented americans , illegal aliens that will be included in the census count, which is going to be a driving factor or to beating factor to the redistricting of places where they reside. in my opinion, those people, if

they are not from this country and they are from somewhere else , until they are documented americans, if you boil it down to me, it is having foreigners influencing our democracy. i think that is just totally wrong. they should not be included in anything to do with our elections or any decisions or the community in which they reside. if they are not documented, they don't count. host: david wasserman? guest: this is what we hear frequently from conservatives, mainly. the constitution requires a whole count and the supreme court has interpreted that to include those who are here in the country illegally. host: five minutes left with you. i wanted to get in jimbo from akers field -- from bakersfield he says the political report

says almost all the polling from last november in congressional races was way off, including yours. he wants to know why given the fact that people lie when directly asked voting questions, should data mining techniques be used as fodder preferences in the future? guest: it is valid question. we do not conduct polls as a political report, but we do work to try and uncover what the parties are finding in their polls. both political parties conduct a number of poles that are not publicly released -- polls that are not publicly released. there is no question democrats and republicans' internal polls were off in this election and underestimated republication -- republicans, particularly down ballot. i think there are a couple of

likely possibilities. the first is that the past president, donald trump, spent a long time, years denigrating polling as an institution to the point that his supporters have been less likely to even pick up the phone and answer a survey. keep in mind that response rates to live interview surveys are down in the low to mid single digits. so relying on a very small slice of the american electorate who is willing to answer the phone to model the attitudes of the other 90 plus percent who won't pick up the phone. that will be the big problem. second of all, in this era of covid, it is possible that democrats were doing better and better among workers in the economy more able to work at home. there voters were in a better position to be able to answer a survey. this differential response had a lot to do with why the polls

very systemically underestimated republican support. we need to make sure that same dynamic will be in play for 2022. president trump did enormously well with voters who are on the margins of political engagement might have been less likely to answer. it is possible those voters not show up in large numbers when president trump is not on the ballot in 2022. we are flying blind with regards to pulling in a number of ways. we will have to rely on fundamentals and what happened in the immediate past election to try and do a better job of modeling what will happen in future years. host: this is lily in the keystone state, democrat. good morning. caller: i belong to a district in pennsylvania and along with the league of women voters, we

have been working very hard to reform our redistricting here. i am calling about the quality of the numbers. i have been following this and i saw there have been millions and had so much problem with the pandemic and hurricanes and collecting the numbers that the area to curtail people was -- i am wondering if there are going to be a lot of lawsuits. mr. dilling hamby it out the door early after a whistleblower complaint and mr. trump putting his hand-picked people in the census bureau during the count. do you think there will be a lot of lawsuits? what is the quality of the numbers when they submit them? guest: this is a question that is a hot topic right now. the census was not able to do the full timetable last fall that it was hoping for.

it was hoping to continue data collection in the field and the supreme court essentially green lit the trump administration to end that early. the data that the census is working with right now and working to correct a number of errors in the count as it always does, but it is taking longer. there are privacy concerns in new privacy protocols that are being implemented to ensure that residents' individual information is not subject to mining as easily. that is part of the reason why we are expecting these delays in the reapportionment release to extend until april 30 for the fall redistricting count to be released in july at the earliest. host: back to florida.

mike, independent. caller: does anybody know exactly how many registered voters are in the united states? guest: there are around i want to say 230 million eligible voters in the u.s. there are around 190 million to 200 million registered voters in the u.s.. the census typically releases the report after the election with responses to a large-scale survey that gets a better handle on that. there were 158.7 million voters who cast a ballot in the presidential election this time around, which was a historically high turnout. host: david wasserman is the house editor at the cook political report or you can find him covering ty as possible andy

a reserve supply for second doses. >> thanks for joining us. welcome to our third covid response briefing. i'm the white house senior adviser for pandemic response. we will have a couple of updates on our progress international strategy to defeat covid-19. >> i'm glad to share the latest facts he