Wednesday, February 2, 2022

Albany Democrats present blatantly gerrymandered redistricting map, Gianaris claims it's justified

 State Senate Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris, who has led his chamber’s redistricting efforts, asserted that his party did not engage in gerrymandering.

 NY Politics

A new and long-awaited proposed New York congressional district map was released by the Senate and Assembly on Sunday. As a result of the 2020 census, the map reflects the state’s loss of one congressional district, bringing the state’s delegation down to 26 members.

New York State legislators are expected to pass the map later this week and send it to Governor Kathy Hochul for her approval. New maps for New York State Assembly and Senate district maps are also expected to be released and approved later this week. Following those enactments, county boards of elections will realign election districts with the new Assembly Jdistricts so petitioning for Spring 2022 primaries can get underway in early March.

The task of drawing the initial line drawing fell to the New York State Legislature after the state’s advisory “Independent Redistricting Commission” failed to agree on congressional and state legislative maps in early January. The commission had been created under a 2014-enacted state constitutional amendment that aimed to remove the legislature from the initial line-drawing process.

This map represents the first opportunity for Democratic Party legislative leaders to manage drawing the state’s congressional maps in 90 years.  In those prior years, Republicans or a politically divided legislature drew the maps. The current congressional lines were drawn by a federal court in 2012 after the legislature failed to come to an agreement on a map.

City & State

State Senate Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris, who has led his chamber’s redistricting efforts, asserted that his party did not engage in gerrymandering despite proposing a new congressional map that clearly benefits Democrats. In an interview with City & State, Gianaris stood by the controversial proposal that could cut the number of Republicans in the New York delegation in half.

The maps clearly disadvantage Republicans, who will likely lose four seats in the next election cycle if the proposal stands. The GOP was quick to denounce the new lines and promised to take the matter to court. But they weren’t the only ones crying foul. The left-leaning think tank Brennan Center for Justice, which focuses on voting rights, said Democrats took a heavy hand to district drawing. Michael Li, the organization’s redistricting expert, called the New York maps an “aggressive gerrymander,” and even asserted they would be struck down under the John Lewis Voting Rights Act that Democrats are championing in Congress. 

Still, Gianaris defended the maps against claims that they were overly partisan, especially in some of the most unusually shaped districts. “We’re very confident this adheres to the current requirements,” Gianaris said, adding that he fully expects the issue to end up in court. “Other people make those decisions, we’ll make our case why we believe it does.”

Given specific examples of districts that have drawn scrutiny, Gianaris offered a legal claim for each. For District 11, currently held by GOP Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, he claimed the new lines “conform to some historical norms for that district” – which apparently just happen to turn the right-leaning swing district into a fairly safe Democratic seat. Expanding District 3, being vacated by Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi, from Long Island into the Bronx and Westchester unites communities of interest along the Long Island Sound, according to Gianaris. He added that this particular decision came from public input from a coalition representing communities of color that presented a “unity” plan, but the move seemed to baffle many. 

 Democrats have been accused of using redistricting to strengthen their position in the state Legislature despite criticizing gerrymandering in the past. “As we unravel the gerrymanders of the past, it doesn't make it a gerrymander of today,” state Senate Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris, who chaired the legislative task force that oversaw redistricting along with Assembly Member Kenneth Zewbrowski from the Hudson Valley, said on The Brian Lehrer Show Tuesday. “These are districts that are drawn fairly,” Gianaris added. Whether or not Gianaris’ rationale rings true despite the proposed Democrat-friendly lines, Republicans did use methods other than line-drawing to help them maintain their state Senate majority in the past. Packing more people in Democratic districts versus GOP areas was one strategy.

43 comments:

Anonymous said...

They are so afraid of losing their hold over new york that they have to redraw maps just to make themselves win. I hope voters finally smarten up and not vote for these same idiots again no matter how the lines are drawn. The dumbocrats have become a very sad political party.

Anonymous said...

I didn't know about this and I watch ‘The View’ everyday.

Anonymous said...

What do you expect? To the victor go the spoils.

They did the same thing to Bob Turner when he beat Weiner (hee hee). That’s how we got Grace Meng.

The fun starts when they have to start eating each other.

Anonymous said...

Lumping Nassau County with the Bronx and Westchester. Ha ha ha ha ha. Gasp. Ha ha ha

NPC_translator said...

But every vote must count!!

Lol!! If the Democrats didn't have blatant hypocrisy, they'd have nothing at all.

Anonymous said...

This should go well🙄

Anonymous said...

Imagine voting for a Democrat at this point lol...

Anonymous said...

It'll take them a long time to catch up to the TrumpTurd party.

Joe said...

Oh I know (and suffered) the consequences of this kinda crap first hand.
They did this redrawing district shit on the Long Island border.
This to include some of Great Necks huge Sec 8 barracks into New Hyde Park and Manhasset.
Result All Republicans lost and the new all Democrat Town of North Hempstead relaxed all the zoning. Result all the old trees, homes are being plowed and replaced with boxes built to the property lines.
Now the whole town is being turned to shit, starting to look like Flushing. You cant drive anyplace in Manhasset without getting a nail in the tire do to all the trucks hauling away home demolition debris.
Streets like Bayview ave are like driving on the moon or in Willets point from all the trucks, you bust your ball joints, rims & shocks. Busted up asphalt chips, roofing, dust, sand, dirt, nails and garbage line Plandome road, Bayview, Stonytown rd and Port Washington blvd.
With a crater on each corner I could only get $910,000K for a nice Cape house in Manhasset when my father died of Covid in the Nursing Home.
Over the years I warned of what was happening but he refused to see or hear it with: "no that's not going to happen" "they cant do that" "I'm not moving"

I'm posting this so those people understand they got to fight this, that bastard communist Gionaris, and democrats with all they got !!
The instigators and supporters want to set a 100% one party communist system and push all in the same pot, stupid, powerless and dependent on them for life.
Vladimir Lenin and Nikita Khrushchev would be so proud !!

-Joe

Anonymous said...

Stealing elections, releasing bio-weapons on unsuspecting population, way to go.
These people are worse than the Nazis and the Commies together.
Gia-canary needs to be redistributed with his pals to the gallows.

Anonymous said...

Do we have a free elections ?
We do have corporate cronies buying politicians to enable monopolistic markets. And media is as much to blame for not reporting on it.

Anonymous said...

Size matters, the size of the wallet.

Anonymous said...

The Democrats want a one-party system. There is hardly any Republican congressional representation in New York now. The gerrymandering foisted upon us by the Democratic state legislature wants to reduce Republican representation even more. What a disgrace! With the Democrats in control in New York City, for instance, crime is out of control, a judge can't set bail in many cases, a DA in Manhattan does not want to prosecute many crimes, illegal immigration is out of control, inflation is rampant, and there is a socialist agenda to reward sloth and penalize individual initiative. Our representatives always seem to bad-mouth the United States of America, where people all over the world want to come because of our freedoms, and praise countries that suppress human rights. We will not stand for this anymore. We need to stop coddling criminals and shed crocodile tears for incarcerated detainees. They are in jail, in most instances, because they have committed crimes, not because they are victims of racism. The Democratic positions are antithetical to a civilized society. It is fervently hoped that the courts can overturn the obviously biased district lines. We have had enough of AOC and her ridiculous ilk. The people deserve better. And when Gianaris says that the lines are fair, he must be kidding. As the saying goes, "Beware of Greeks bearing gifts."

Anonymous said...

Anonymous said...

It'll take them a long time to catch up to the TrumpTurd party.

And explain to me, how's that Joe biden working out for you? I heard that he's killing it:
Killing the economy
Killing freedom of speech
Killing the middle class
Killing small businesses
Killing jobs

Anonymous said...

And on tonight's episode of Communist Democrats Strike Again.

Anonymous said...

DeMoRats Jerking the Sheeple like a puppet !

Anonymous said...

It's always been said to never ask the question; "How much worse can it get?" At this point, I don't really think it matters.

Anonymous said...

Miss Trump yet ?

Anonymous said...

​Until you break up the GOP/DNC Cabal and take over like what Trump tried to do - nothing is going to change.

Anonymous said...

@And explain to me, how's that Joe biden working out for you? I heard that he's killing it:
Killing the economy
Killing freedom of speech
Killing the middle class
Killing small businesses
Killing jobs "

The economy is overheating, that'w why the Fed wants to raise rates.
Only places where free speech is being killed is in Florida, and Texas, etc. where fascist Governors are passing laws to restrict same.
Ronald Regan Killed the middle class by destroying unions.
Small Business are being killed by large corporations. TrumTurd did nothing to curb corporate power. In fact, he increased corporate power.

Killing jobs ? Where? Employers complain that they can't find employees. It doesn't help that most treat their employees like crap and pay them crap. (See Gino's posts) for an example of an asshole employer.

Just because you are unemployable or living in a Federal prison, doesn't mean things are bad for everyone. Stop watching fake right-wing nonsense on YouTube and Fox, and get outside into the real world.






Anonymous said...

Democrats are still playing softball with a bunch of traitorous TrumpTurds.

Anonymous said...

Vladimir Lenin and Nikita Khrushchev would be so proud !!

Add envy to the AI improved original bolshevik system.

Anonymous said...

How can the 6th congressional district lines be fair? This district combines Middle Village, a mostly conservative area with a predominance of German, Italian, and Irish residents, with a large Democrat swath of Flushing (little China). The Chinese residents of Flushing have little or nothing in common with the residents of Middle Village. A Chinese representative (such as Grace Meng), under these circumstances, will be elected for life, even though she seems to ignore the non-Chinese areas of the district. The residents of Middle Village have no congressional representation with the district lines such as they are. Shame on the Democrats who drew such lines for their own political advantage. One correction to an above comment; Turner beat Weprin, not Weiner, before the congressional district was gerrymandered to give the seat to a Democrat.

Anonymous said...

@"Do we have a free elections ?We do have corporate cronies buying politicians to enable monopolistic markets. And media is as much to blame for not reporting on it."

Very true, thanks to a crooked supreme court that believes corporations are people. And you TrumpTurds keep voting for the same clowns who put these crooks on the bench.

Gino said...

Killing jobs ?
Nobody's killing jobs.

The problem is Millennials do not believe in working (earning) your way to the top via work. They want instant gratification, instant $100K+ job or don't want to work at all.
I been a contractor for 40 years and never seen anything like this.
23 year old males that demand $45 an hour yet cant even carry one piece of sheetrock, 2 inch pipe, toolbox, walk off the job running home to momma crying "it's to hard" Gino's a slave driver.
Have a complete meltdown when you scream for the 5th time PUT THAT DAM CELLPHONE AWAY and concentrate on the machinery and people around you !!
No F-cking texting facebooks around the tablesaw go home your fired!!!
They always quit (jobs to hard) or I have to fire them for others safety and insurance reasons.

It seems most want jobs in liberal arts and useless crap nobody will pay them one cent for. I remember Hillary Clinton speaking "be who you wanna be, don't worry the government will pay for you" Lousy parents are also the blame, many used Disney Channel and purple dinosaurs as baby sitters and teachers wile they were away getting stoned.

Another odd recent thing is why this sudden epidemic of effeminate "soft" males who don't know if they are boy or girl who are incapable of understanding the meanings of ethics, work and earning?


-Gee

Anonymous said...

Only places where free speech is being killed is in Florida, and Texas, etc. where fascist Governors are passing laws to restrict same.

Your brain cells are dead. Corporate power like Joemicron Burisma Robinette Bidet who talks about good old days when he got along just fine with the Robert Byrds of the world all while his Geriatric Despot ass is being supported by Facebook, Google, Amazon, Microsoft not to mention Blackrock, Vanguard and the rest of the corrupt bankers.
What is so important in Ukraine? His fucking corruption? The money laundry under Obongo?
Or the RINO-s and DemoRats who get fat on CCP money?
Is this what you are talking about you 2 bit moron?

You are either provoking or just plain and simple you are the biggest asshole on the face of the planet.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for the correction. I forgot Weiner had already resigned

Anonymous said...

It’s ok when Republicans do it though right? If you Trumptards really don’t like gerrymandering, you would have supported the national anti-gerrymandering law the DEMS put up.

Anonymous said...

“Omg gerrymandering is so awful”-Every Libtoid

Anonymous said...

This should be done by a non-partisan group. Politicians shouldn’t be picking their constituents.

Anonymous said...

Middle Village is changing daily. Becoming more Chinese actually. For what its worth, Chinese voters in Queens and Brooklyn went overwhelmingly for Sliwa in the mayoral race. Almost 70% of the vote went for Sliwa in certain Asian districts. This, of course, is a gift from G-d for the Republican Party if they actually capitalized on it. But the Queens Republicans will do what they always do when presented with an opportunity to rebuild their party; NOTHING.

Anonymous said...

Tucker and Joe Rogan have now become the voice of people who realize it doesnt matter if its Democrats or Republicans. Neither party cares about whats best for the American people.

Anonymous said...

"Stop watching fake right-wing nonsense on YouTube and Fox, and get outside into the real world."

It always tickles me when leftists use this line. Because 95% of the "real world" mainstream media that promotes left-wing orthodoxy never lies, right? So naive.

Anonymous said...

"So naive" and in a cult.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, like when CNN gave Donna Brazile the questions to the Hilary-Trump debate beforehand. Lol. Leftist media is so honorable

Anonymous said...

Chinese actually have lots in common with white middle class.
They hate communism (socialism) and democrats.
Many live with 3 generations of people in the household and nobody want grandma getting hit over the head by some angry black out of jail for the 10th time, angry drunken Mexican or pushed under a bus by some nutter from a homeless shelter.
And those examples are just for start !!

Joe said...

"The Chinese residents of Flushing have nothing in common"

I'm not to sure all Chinese are the same, could the flushing ones be different?
I can tell one story about Chinese who were building a big house when I had the house in Manhasset
Turns out the owner of a big shitter going up in the crater 3 houses down was a doctor from China brought in by N Shore hospital was walking a dog.
He seemed to be a nice guy, bad English but he asked "what do you think" of the construction ?
I replied well to high for the other homes but most disturbing is all these railings with dozens of bowling pins and balls. Why all that, They are out of place like the Russian building in Forest Hills. Are you using the same builders?
Zoey then jumped in and said its called Bukharin and Greek revival style and those are called "Balustrades" Then: Go inside the washer is leaking I will explain.

From what I understood she explained if you want something harmonious its gotta fit the surroundings. In this case you have trees, older homes here. Nothing in nature is shaped like bowling pins, balls.
She then got a book with photos of old Chinese buildings and NOTHING in it was white, blond brick or bowling pins. It was dominantly dark woods and colors, lots of greens and reds.
She gave the guy the book.
Well, 2 weeks later all that weird shit was torn away and replaced with nice teak and such. It turns out the architects and builders are using all this shit to make builds look more bold and expensive using cheap prefab materials.
The Asians buying these homes don't know any better, they need to be educated.

-Joe

Anonymous said...

"Stop watching fake right-wing nonsense on YouTube and Fox, and get outside into the real world."

Sure, we all should be like you and watch the CIA sponsored Sex Club action from CNN with up to date sexual assaults, sex with children and other felony type activities.

Anonymous said...

They are out of place like the Russian building in Forest Hills.

Joe, those are Bukhari houses. By any means they are not Russian, their misfortune is being part of the Soviet Union, hence forced learning of the Russian language.

Anonymous said...

Previous poster is correct. Chinese are getting close to having the numbers to resurrect the Republican party in the city. Many are switching to GOP organically due to crime, socialism, and the dumbing-down of the specialized high schools. Now if only the clods who run the carcass of what used to be the GOP here would get off their ass and speed things along.

Anonymous said...

The GOP in Queens is dead. The only GOP strongholds left in Queens are the Mafiaesque Howard Beach community, parts of Middle Village, though it's changing with the influx of immigrants, and Bayside. The elected Councilwoman of Bayside made the Republican Party look bad by failing to comply with COVID regulations and being denied admittance to the Council chamber. The other elected Republican Councilwoman's son got a job with the Board of Elections, even though she tried to conceal any role in getting her son the job by saying that she couldn't recall whether or not she submitted his resume (in a TV interview). Supporters of Felicia Singh, the Democrat opponent of the Howard Beach Councilwoman, were harassed by supporters of the Councilwoman (in media reports). A GOP judge was elected in Queens even though he had unsuccessfully run repeatedly in the past without approval from the relevant bar associations until 2021, and submitted Republican petitions for City Council in 2017 even though he did not live in the district and failed to do any campaigning until he withdrew in favor of the Democrat Holden. A convicted felon involved with political machinations did work for the Queens GOP. It is agreed that many Chinese have conservative tendencies, but because of the redistricting, connecting places like Middle Village with Flushing, there is no way in hell that a non-Chinese GOP candidate, no matter how qualified, can prevail over a Chinese candidate like Grace Meng in the district, even though her father was penalized for political shenanigans in the past. Sliwa did not run against a major Chinese candidate. He ran against Adams, an African-American. That's what I meant.

Anonymous said...

Previous poster is only partially right. The Queens GOP is dead due to a lack of leadership and the ridiculous 40-year North-South Civil War. That said, Breezy Point, Belle Harbor. Whitestone, Middle Village, and Douglas Manor are still Repulican strongholds by City standards.Even Bayswater in the Rockaways is becoming more Republican due to the growing community of Orthodox Jews. Bayside and Howard Beach are not Republican strongholds at all. If Howard Beach was Republican. Addabbo never would have beat Ulrich in the Senate race some years ago. And Bayside hasnt had a competitive Republican since Padavan got trounced years ago. Don't say Ariolas landslide win was due to Howard Beach being Republican because it's not (but it should be.) Singh was a horrible candidate and Joann is well-known, well liked, and received many votes from Dems. And if you're upset that a Fepublican got their child a job, well, that's a fart in a windstorm compared to the patronage the Dems routinely do (see:certain buildings on Sutphin Boulevard) Agreed that many Chinese would not support a non-Asian over Meng but a Chinese Republican candidate would be formidable now.

Anonymous said...

I didn't mean that registered Republicans outnumber registered Democrats in the mentioned areas. What I meant was that conservative leaning voters seem to predominate in Howard Beach and the Bayside area, whether registered Democrats or Republicans. Otherwise, they wouldn't have voted for conservative leaning legislators like Ariola, Paladino, Ulrich, and Padavan. Also, I was referring to an interview with Ariola, conducted by Courtney Gross of Channel 1 News, I believe, who was investigating nepotism in the Board of Elections. Nepotism and patronage should be banned in the Board of Elections to create at least an appearance of fairness in this very important agency. If there was nothing wrong with such nepotism, then why did Ariola hem and haw when asked if she used her influence as a political leader to get her relative a job? And, if Singh was such a horrible candidate, then how did she manage to win a Primary? Even if she were a horrible candidate, that doesn't justify harassment of her supporters by Ariola supporters in the Rockaway area. The prevalence of Democrat patronage should also be discouraged. The point about Meng was that the Flushing area should not be connected with Middle Village through the gerrymandering process. These two areas should be in separate districts, so that a non-Chinese candidate would have a chance. The Democrats have done their best to guarantee the election of Democrat candidates, for the most part, throughout Queens.