What Redistricting Looks Like In Every State

Republican Gov. Bill Lee signed the new congressional map passed by the state legislature into law Feb. 6, despite criticism and threats of lawsuits from Democrats in the state. The new map eliminates one of two Democratic districts in the state and has an efficiency gap of R+16.9, prompting Democratic Rep. Jim Cooper, who has been a member of Congress for more than three decades, to announce he will not seek reelection.

Among the most contentious decisions in the map was the one to divide Nashville up into three districts. Nashville is the county seat of Davidson County, which currently fits entirely within the state’s 5th District, a Democratic stronghold with a D+17 lean. But this map shifts the 5th District southwest, to include more rural, Republican-leaning counties. Under the proposal, the rest of Davidson County is split and folded into the 7th District to the northwest and the 6th District to the east, two districts currently held by the GOP.

Democrats have continued to criticize the Republican proposal, arguing that dividing up fast-growing Nashville would lump many communities of color into districts with majority-white and conservative counties. The state Democratic party has already vowed to sue, tweeting on Feb. 4 that if the governor signed the bill, it would be “game on.”