Ohio's New Districts

This is only preliminary but I don't think there will be too many changes. I don't like it.


The deal that was reached is obviously that one Republican and one Democrat will go away. In this case, Marcy Kaptur (D) loses her district to Dennis Kucinich (D). Ms. Kaptur would then have to go through Bob Latta (R) but with all the Democratic votes staying in 9, Ms. Kaptur is likely a dead woman walking.

On the Republican side, District 3 and District 7 are completely moved, pitting their two representatives, Mike Turner (R) and Steve Austria (R), against each other. As Austria is the newbie and Turner has the city of Dayton behind him, Turner will probably get the nod to take over.

Splitting the difference is the new District 16. Cutting up to the outskirts of Cleveland and Akron, it absorbs a lot of what was District 13. This will pit Democrat Betty Sutton against Republican Jim Renacci. District 16 was held by a Democrat following the 2008 election but taken back by the Republicans in 2010. I imagine this district is designed such that Wayne County will keep it Republican, but the proximity to two major metro areas will probably make this a swing district in some years.

The two most appalling things about the map are Districts 1 and 15. It is a simple given that Columbus would be given it's own unique district (that the Democrats will control easily) and the movement of District 3 to here is somewhat understandable. But the twisting and looping done to keep Steve Stivers (R) with a nice Republican district is painful to see.

District 1 is almost worse. District 1 has, and probably always will be, dominated by the city of Cincinnati. However, the district has become much more competitive over the past few years (being held by a Democrat from 2008-2010). The move to attach heavily Republican Warren County (where I live) to District 1 is a blatant move to swing the scales from even to strong Republican. Even worse, despite it's growing population, Warren County will be completely ignored as city issues dominate the plate of the representative (currently Steve Chabot).

The net takeaway is that out of sixteen districts, Democrats will dominate four of them (3, 9, 11, and 13). There will probably be close fights for Districts 6 and 16 and they will go as Ohio and the nation goes. But for the 2012 elections, I would expect that the Republicans will have 12 seats while the Democrats have 4.