What is gerrymandering?
Gerrymandering is the political manipulation of electoral district boundaries by mapmakers to control the outcomes of elections, generally to favor one political party over another. Two tactics that have been used to ensure a political outcome are “cracking” and “packing” districts.
Cracking a district involves diluting the power of voters from the opposition party, by splitting those voters off into districts where they are in the minority, thus diluting their voting power and eliminating their chance to elect a candidate from their party.
Packing a district concentrates the voters from the opposition party into as few districts as possible. While the opposing party’s candidate will win the election in the “packed” district, the more numerous surrounding districts will be less competitive, ensuring candidates from the ruling party are elected in those districts.
In Illinois, the mapmakers are incumbent legislators, and the process is controlled by the majority Democratic party. Asserting their dominance, the Democrats have crafted maps to further disadvantage Republican voters and to erode the balance of power. Extreme partisan bias has led to maps that continue to concentrate power into a handful of people as we have seen in the trial of former Speaker Michael Madigan. Rigged maps have led to abuse of power, corruption and hundreds of thousands of disenfranchised voters.
Read what the media is saying about gerrymandering:
- Illinois election results show gerrymandering’s bad outcome
- Voters in President Harmon & Speaker Welch’s townships want Fair Maps
- Illinois may be worst Democratic gerrymander in the country
- Driving the vote: Illinois farmers feel forgotten in blue state
- How some politicians are fighting back against gerrymandering
