today, a hearing in calirnia on the way to finish proposed water storagerojects in the state to lp combat drought and flooding, held by a subcmittee. watclive at 5:00 p.m. eastern on c-span now, the free mobile video app, or online at c-span.org. order your copy of the 118 congressional directory, now available at cpanshop.org, your access to the federal government with bio and contact informatn for every house and senate member and important inrmation on congressional committees. scan the code to order your copy today, or go to c-spanshop.org. $9.95 plus shipping and handling and every purchase helps to support nonprofit operations. ♪

>> since 1979, and partnership with the cable industry, c-span has provided a comple coverage of the halls of congress, from the house and senate floors to congressional hearings, party briefings and committee meetings. c-span gives you a front row seat to her issues are debated and decided, with no commentary, no interruption and completely unfiltered. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. is david wasserman from cook political report house editor he is here to talk about swing districts. how do you define swing district? guest: a district that has a partisan score that tends to

produce the most competitive races and we have tracked those r 25 years. weust came out with an archi at cook political.com for every congress back to 1997. the number of swing distric have fallen from 164 to just 82. that is attributed to a combination voters, a polarization between urban and rural parts of the country and photos moving to neighrhoods where people agree with their values and redistricting and the tendency of parties gerrymandering and the republicans have had the advantagend they have

increased safety repuican seats whereas recalculating the scores to reflect election results. as far as how they compute the scores t determine the redistricting. we look at the presidential race for every 435 districts and we take the difference between at district and the national result. a district with the score the vote f the republican candidate, we put them against a district that got 53% of the vote. we use -- we rated 75% of the

score for the presidential election. host: swing states are downo 80 plus, what is it mean for those competing in those states for offices? guest: it has an impact on the competitive structures that members of congress need for passing votes. it used to be votes. it used to be that 164 swing districts was greater then the number of soundly democratic or republican districts. now, that isess than 20% of the house. over 80% of the members of congress are elected from

districts where the primary is tantount to an election. the overwhelming share of legislatures are playing to a primary base because their only threat would come from someone who is further right or further left than you are. this is meant that most of the competition is now i states that have maps that were drawn in a more neutral manner not bipartisan legislatures trying to maximize their advantage. there are 13 states that were mapped to the most most recent s that were drawn by a nonpartisan commission or a court. the balance in the house is going to come down to states like california, arizona, new york. host: david wasserman is joining us for this conversation.

when you want to talk to to redistricting, call and let him know. (202) 748-8000 for republicans, (202) 748-8001 for democra and (202) 748-8002 independents four and you can text us at (202) 748-8003. cancan you go back to the last house election and see the results as far as the close margins we saw? is that because what you see in the swingtates or what's going on at large? est: we had 350 competitive races which which tracks prettyl with the number of seats that we have in our range as -- we would

expect that around that same number of seats will be competitive this next time around. ep in mind there are 18 repuicans that holseats the joe biden carried in 2020. there are five democrats that hold seats that donald trump in those will be at the top of the target list the next time around. part of that is that republicans despite underperforming what history might have suggested they should do in the midterms, th maned to do qui well in california and new york. in new york state alone, yo have six republicans who represent democrat seats in the past they only had two. democrats see their route back to houseajority running through tse six seats in ne

york, seven in california and other states. part of the challenge r democrats is that republicans could go back and redraw maps and otr states. at the same time, democrats pick up seats in north carolina and ohio last fall republicans took back control of the state supreme court and tt is important because state supreme court's were the ones to invalidated the republican gerrymandering is the lastime around. if these new state supreme courts agree in my legislatures to go back to revisit those lines in the middle of the decade that could give republicans an additionafive seats in the house and doubled theirushion considering they sit on a narrow majority. host: that'just for the house, you don't see anything happening

on the local level or does it impact local elections to? guest: this trends across the board. we see a decline in the number of swingtates, swing districts, swing counties and neighborhoods. take counties where we haven't seen the boundaries of the county's change in recent decades and yet in 1990 2, 60 1% of american voters lived in -- only 38 percent of voters in 1992 cast balance in landslide counties. today that numbers 58%. we have seen americans live in communities that are political homogenous and that it is a

result of polarization. we have seen democrats doing better and betterith those who have college degrees and they tend to cluster in urban and suburban settings. you have seen a hollowing out for democrats in more rural parts of the country like kentucky. this is coal country in eastern kentucky. that is when we first came out with our index in 1997. today, it the second most republicanistrict in the country. host: david wasserman is here, with the cook repo quickly remind people of what that is? guest: it analyzes house,

gubernatorial and state elections. i have been covering house races for the past 15 years and we meet th candidates. we talk with consultants and ad makers and each party. we talk with party committees who spend a lot of money and we also take a quantitative, analytical approach to demographic trends and try to balance and calibrate these factors to our outlook of whh party is likely to do well in each seat. host: let us hear from rick in chatnooga, tennessee on the independent line. let's go to richard in georgia

on the democratic line. caller: good morni sir. one of theiggest things i have noticed is howhe democratic party throu four democratic seats in the democratic party did not give donation money to the topandidates idifferent states and senate races, wisconsin, micgan, north carolina and you wonder why the democrats lost the house to the republicans. new york messed everything up with losing those four seats. guest: there is a criticism that the caller expressed that democrats left seats of the

ble because they did not realize how well they would do in some parts and it came within 26,000 votes of winning a senate seat in wisconsi although democrats spent money elsewhere theyid snd a considerable amount of money on mandela barnes in the race. losing a bunch of ses in new york state and that included the chair of the democratic campaign committee. there was only so much the democrats and d. could do to control what was going on in albany. democrats in new york tried to gerrymander a map thatould give them 22 out of 26 seats. they pasd a constitutional amendment that was supposed t curtail gerrymandering in the narrow majority enforce that amendment and said that

redistricting needed to be done by a special master. that special master drewines that included competitive seats. wh we noticed in 20 is that democrats did well in stes in the midwest where abortion had been a flashpoint. they did noto as well in a number of soliy blue states where there were fewer threats to abortion access and the races played out along lines of inflation and crime. neyork being such a solid state at the presidentl level at the party has not invested the infrastructure to turn out a loof the voters. that handicaps democrats and those house races. they will not make that same error in 2024. they will fully fund races. we have already seen grge

santos is unlikely to win renomition in new york's third congressional district. host: a story coming out this week that both the governor of new york and attorney general looking to change around the current lines going on. could you explain that? guest: the ruling that overturned the gerrymander that albany democrats passed was very narrow. the changes made at the court of appeals is giving democrats hope for leaders to change the boundaries in time for 2024. there will be pressure on them given to what we will likely see in north carolina where the republicans are looking at cracking the lines open the summer and drawing a map that could convert a partisan

breakdown to a 11-3 republican route. democrats could say that our only path to work remaining competitive is this nuclear arms race of redistricting. host: let's hear from kathleen in mississippi. caller: good morning. what i am calling about, everybody talking about gerrymandering and redlining. if you live in a rural area. when i was six years old i was raped by my uncle and nobody did anything about it. it was sad when i hadn't ectopic pregnancy.

this is not about health care, this is about our rights. host i think we are going back to the last discussion. we have someone on twitter askingbout gerrymandering. if there is connection between that and what you see in the swing states? est: we see a number of states that are competitive statewide, less so wi the district level. in wisconsin, you had a close presidential election. obviously, it was somewhat decisive when donald trump one, decisive when joe biden flipped the state. and yet at the congressional level there are six republicans and two democrats because of the way the state's geography lends itself towards republican advantage. democratic voters are very paed in madison and in

milwaukee. as long as you u neutral principles and redistricting in those ars are kept together you will end up with two strong democratic districts and the rest of the state needs republican. these more liberal factions just retook control b 04-three margin of the supreme court in the election earlier this month and at has some democrats believing that lines for state government and congress could be redrawn in a way that gives democrats more of an even footing. in order to do that, you would have to crack up these major, urban areas. host: this is karen from tampa, florida. caller: i have three questis, first questions of the 32 states that are gerrymandered, how many

of those are gerrymandered for republicans benefit and how many for democrat secondly, i am in florida. florida see to be extremely gerrymdered, is that the case? which dates are the most gerrymandered? thank you very much. guest: that is a great questio florida is a state where republicans have aggressive gerrymander in 2021. flora had passed a fair lines constitutional amendment back in 20 that led to a ste court intervening in the last second opposing lines that were more democratic. in 2021 the republican legislator considered a map that would have preserve thstatus

quo giving republicans an additional sea governor desantis disagreed and outmaneuvered h own state redistricting commiee leaders and pushed successfully for a map that gave republicanan additional four seats. obviously, republicans had a eat year and florida notwithstanding e maps. now the breakdown in florida is 20 republican and eight mocrats and that is a mimum map for publicans. another state with aggressive gerrymandering for republicans in texas. before our most recent partisanship scores, there were 14 districts and a lot of those were suburban seats that had

become moreurple as democrats made advances in the subur. republicans packed more democrats into urban seats which moved those suburban seats to higher grounand now there are only two swing districts by our finition and taxes. we went from 14 to 2. there are six states thatnly have one district. there are two that have bipartisan compromises that lead to maps. of the remaining states, the only ones democrats were able to gerrymander were illinois where they have a -3 advantage with some pretty creative lines that defy geometry.

and in w mexicand oregon. the democra were able to sweep new mexico, they hold four out of six seats and in divide as well. no doubt, the republicans have major opportunities and gerrymandering gains in tennessee, georgiatexas and florida. host: how are boundaries determined. as far as the actual map is concerned, what is involved in that? guest: districts have to be equal populac for the mt part, they havto be within a person of each other and that requires splitting the city blocks in some instances. you have the voting rights act which is constantly up for

judicial reintpretation. there will be a key case that will be decided this tm. this is a challenge that arose from alabama. the voting rigs act says that if a group is sufficient enough to form a majority in a district , sufficiently racially polarized there must be an opportunity for that group tbe able to elect their candidate of choi. civil rights groups in alabama as well as democrats objected to the p the republicans drew this time around in alabama that features just one african-american districts out of seven, the states black population is 27%.

they arg it would be proportional and required of the voting rights act to draw an additional block opportunity c the supreme court will decide whether the dirict court was correct in returning the district. the federal panel was made up of two trump appointees. you ve a major qstion as far as interpreting the voting rights act that could have repercussions in alabama but also georgia, south carolina, louisiana and there are very sophistited mapping applications out there that allow whoever's in charge from state to state to draw lines but increasingly that has been demoatized. the same level of advanced software that used to be the province of highly paid

nsultants is available on web-basedlatforms that anyone can use. host: a viewer makes a reference to ai and if that is parof the process as well? guest: that's part of the discussion with gerrymandering experts and academics in the last few decades. could we move to algorithmic redistricting where our own bias does not play as much as a role? someone would have to write the code of how you draw those lines. you cod develop a program that says what is the shortest possible line to dividthe state into equally populous stricts and see what happens. could it be better? from a small d democratic standpoint, the awnout

processes that we ha nowhat lead to high-priced legal fights, may be. host: david wasserman is joining us. let's hear from joyce and taxes on the democrat line. caller: i have two questions, my first question is on redistricting, are they supposed to redistrict after the census only one time? it seems like to me i remember some states and in texas in particular they redistricted midyear after the census was taken. my second question is, wha could be done about people who are elected as a member of one party and then once they are in office for whatever reason they decide they want to switch

parties? should they be made to give up their seat and let the people run another election because it seem that is a bait and switch on the voters. if they elected you as a republican or democrat and you decide to change it was like you were bei dishonest with them. have you done any studies on that? thank you. guest: those are two excellent questions. to your first question, taxes did redistrict midecade in 2004 when republican legislatures did not like the p that a court had imposed in 2002. that was very controversial and it was spearheaded by tom delay and it allows republicans to pick up house seats and put

several rural democrats out a job by drawing their district and altering them in profound ways. we have seen other states like georgia engage in that practice. the state that has seen the most change is north carolina. they will have a new congressional map in 2020 four regardless of what the legislature decides becau by state law the map that the court drew in 2022 is temporary. it is only valid for one election cycle. it is about to have his fifth different congressional map in six election cycles and this is become confusing for voters. it becomes difficult for members of congress to follow on casework. our political boundariesave

real-life consequences for voters and constituents. the caller's qution about party switchers, there have been a number of incidents of members of congress and state legislatures who have switch parties. the most recent example that grates onemocrats is a legislator from charlotte who just switch parties from democrat to

she was a candidate who made it to congress. she ran a campaign in the right place at the right time. democrats did not spend a whole lot of money on this contest. they didn't think it was winnable but you had some democratic leaning pacs that were based in washington they came in late in the contest and spent on her behalf and made the

difference by painting can't is to ask- kent is toxtreme right for the district. rank is taking off i cities and it is e law into states for congressional elections that's alaska a maine. rank-choice voting fuses people but itas led to more competitive electns in alaska and maine. it'no accident that four of the five democrats represent districts th trump carried in alaska and maine, they hold seats in part because of rank-choice voting. it allowed them to win second placend third choice votes from vers who h cast ballots

for inpendent candidates were in the case of alaska, sar palin, the republican former governor who was highly unpopular after spending a lot of time outse the state, she advanced to the instant runoff. a lot of theotes from theore conventional republican who came thd place ended up going to the competitor or they didn't rank a second choice. that exhaust of those ballots. that allowed a democrat to win alaska for the first time in many decades. host: dave wasserman from cook political is joining us in talking about redistricting and other topics. let's hear from james in connecticut, republican line. caller: good morning. i have a very political question

for your guest based on my exriences where i live now in connecticut and formerly in washingtontate. in many of what we call swing districts, we have what's called an open primary system. the docratic party has been very successl of havingheir democrat voters vote for the worst possible republican candidate in those primaries as reblicans. i saw this in the last election cycle. you had a democratic strategist whbragged how they had flipped 60ouse and senate seats by putting up the wst possible maga candidates collusion in the primary. do you feel this is a good thing r democracy, that we have the democric party bragging about how they are rigging the election so at the republican candidates who republicans want don't actually get to run r office but in fact