After the Massachusetts state House and Senate both voted on Nov. 17 to approve a new map for the state’s nine congressional districts, Gov. Charlie Baker signed the state’s new congressional maps on Nov. 22. Unlike the last redistricting process, which, due to the state losing a congressional seat, was more dramatic, the changes here are fairly minor. If the map is approved, the state will continue to have nine solidly Democratic congressional districts and no Republican ones.
Of note is the fact that the map rejoins the city of Fall River, which had previously been split between two districts, but it does not place it in the same district as New Bedford — a move activists had sought because both have relatively high shares of immigrant and minority populations. Over the weekend, Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin criticized the map for dividing up communities and said Democrats are engaging in gerrymandering “this time out.”
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