Fact Checker: Loebsack and competitive districts in Congress

Introduction

'Fewer and fewer congressional districts in America are at all competitive, so folks who work across the aisle don't exist as much as they used to do. ... When you have a redistricting situation where more and more of the districts are considered safe, it only makes sense that the folks in those seats who are risk averse and want to be re-elected continue to operate in a situation when they try to please their base more than anything else because they don't want a primary challenger.'

Source of claim: U.S. Rep. Dave Loebsack, D-Iowa City, speaking at a political discourse seminar by the University of Iowa Public Policy Center.

Analysis

This Fact Checker will focus on whether 'fewer and fewer' congressional seats are competitive, or put another way, if more and more are 'safe.'

Loebsack's staff pointed to the Cook Political Report as the main source. The non-partisan newsletter, which has been published since 1984, analyzes campaigns for the U.S. House, Senate, governors and presidency and produces the 'partisan voting index' or PVI to score the competitiveness of the 435 districts in the country.

According to the Cook PVI, the number of competitive seats decreased from 164 in 1998 to 90 in 2012. As of 2016, the Cook Report identified only 18 GOP and four Democratic tossup seats, 13 GOP- and five Democratic-leaning seats, and 379 safe congressional seats (174 Democratic and 205 GOP). Leaning seats are considered competitive.

Others also measure political leanings.

Nate Silver, a statistician who founded the FiveThirtyEight blog and correctly predicted the outcomes of all 50 states in the 2012 presidential election, estimated 103 competitive congressional seats existed in 1992 and 35 after the 2012 election. He estimated the number of landslide districts — ones where the local presidential vote margin differed by 20 percentage points from the national margin — increased from 123 to 242.

But how do you define competitive?

In both the Silver and the Cook model, competitiveness is ranked as a score, which is based on the difference between national presidential results and local district results.

In the Cook PVI, if a seat scores within the range of plus 5 for either party, it is considered competitive.

The average of the two most recent national presidential votes is measured against the average of the local congressional district vote. So, for example, the national average of the last two presidential cycles was 52 percent for Democrats, in this case President Barack Obama, and 46.5 for the Republicans, former Gov. Mitt Romney in 2012 and Sen. John McCain in 2008. The presidential vote in Iowa District 2, Loebsack's seat, averaged 56.45 Democratic and 42.15 Republican.

District 2 would rank as a D-plus-4 because the district vote was 4 points higher than the national vote.

Loebsack's seat is considered competitive. By contrast, Kansas Republican Tim Huelskamp is in a seat scored R-plus-23, or extremely safe.

The Cook PVI is a well-respected tool in political circles, said Michael C. Li, senior counsel of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law.

Political parties have internal models also, which may vary slightly by factoring in other metrics, such as polling, but both Democrats and Republicans generally agree that the plus 5 or more range is the safe seat zone, he said.

'For districts to be competitive, it has to be within 5 points on a party basis,' Li said. 'Anything more than that is not something people would look at as competitive unless something on the ground has changed.'

Gerrymandering, in which district boundaries are redrawn to favor one party, is one reason for the decline in competitiveness, but not the only one, Li said.

'Political topography' shifts have also naturally solidified district preferences, he said. For example, southern whites increasingly vote Republican, and blacks and Latinos lean Democratic, he said. Growing urban areas tend to attract left-leaning voters, he said.

But doesn't it all balance out if some districts are safely Democratic and others are safely Republican?

Loebsack blames the lack of competitiveness for increasing polarization in Congress. Politicians in 'safe' districts see primary challengers as a greater threat than a candidate from the opposite party in a general election, Loebsack said. Therefore, Loebsack contends, elected officials are rewarded for holding to more divisive, partisan views and have less incentive to compromise and reach consensus.

Li said Loebsack's assessment is 'absolutely true.' A perfect example is in Florida, where Republicans have dominated state politics for years, he said. A Florida court ruled the state senate district map favored Republicans in violation of anti-gerrymandering laws, and new maps are being drawn.

'Already, members of the Florida Senate are being more moderate,' Li said. 'The gun lobby has lost key votes. People are becoming more sensitive to the general election whereas in the past they would pay less attention because there were no consequences.'

Conclusion

At least two nationally respected statistical models support Loebsack's claim that districts are less competitive than they have been, which the part of his statement that the Fact Checker measured. We score Loebsack's claim on that an A

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Criteria

The Fact Checker team checks statements made by an Iowa political candidate/office holder or a national candidate/office holder about Iowa, or in advertisements that appear in our market. Claims must be independently verifiable. We give statements grades from A to F based on accuracy and context.

If you spot a claim you think needs checking, email us at factchecker@thegazette.com.

This Fact Checker was researched and written by B.A. Morelli.