Letter

TO THE EDITOR

Gerrymandering

To the editor:

So now, the Kansas Legislature is getting close to declaring a special session. The Senate has voted for it. As of this writing, the House has not yet.

It would be to consider congressional redistricting, transgender rights, and property taxes. But we know the main push is for redistricting — that is, to gerrymander so that they can likely take away the only Democratic Congressional seat Kansas has, that of Sharice Davids. They are trying to get 4-0 Republican representation.

Ty Masterson, the Senate president, insists that this representation would be more like the state is.

“We are a Republican state,” he said, “Redistricting is essential to ensure Kansas’ congressional map reflects the people of our state, supporting President Trump’s agenda with a Republican Congress.”

That would be true only if there were zero Democrats in the state. But, there’s not. Look at the actual votes in Kansas in the 2024 presidential election.

Republicans Donald J. Trump and J.D. Vance	758,802	57.16%
Democrats Kamala D. Harris and Tim Walz	544,853	41.04%
Independents Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Nicole Shanahan	16,322	1.23%
Libertarians Chase Oliver and Mike ter Maat	7,614	0.57%

So, to have four Republican Congress members and zero Democrats would leave 544,853 Kansan voters — yes, a half million — with no representation.

If you leave it like it is now, 3-1, it would give Democrats 25% representation, when the votes for president indicate that they were 41.04%.

If you had 2-2 representation, that would be closer. In a perfect world, if there were five representatives, and you could have a 3-2 mix, which would be almost exactly the 60-40 split now. But we don’t have five.

This started with Trump telling the Texas Legislature to gerrymander so they could get five more Republicans in Congress in 2026.

Trump has pushed other states do the same. That was answered by California putting on the ballot a provision to get five more Democrats. At least California has left the question up to the people.

Unless I missed it somewhere, there is no provision in either the U.S. Constitution or the Kansas Constitution that says you can redistrict in the middle of a 10-year census cycle.

So, this effort to give a warped and unfair advantage is illegal and unconstitutional on its face.

“You can’t change the rules mid-fight because you’re afraid you can’t win,” Davids said.

State Senator Cindy Holscher, a candidate for governor, said: “There is no reason to redistrict mid-decade except to rig the system in one party’s favor over another. That’s not democracy. That’s cheating.”

Ty Masterson, who has thrown his hat into the ring for governor, makes claims that are at least inaccurate and at most outright lying.

In last week’s Record, Eric Meyer showed maps of convoluted gerrymandering. The current 2nd congressional district map is already ridiculous. You realize now what extreme lengths Republican map makers went to in order to get their advantage.

Our state senators and representatives represent us. They’re voting on this right now. Never forget we are living in times that are not normal.

Brian Stucky, Goessel