Stop accusations of retaliation and partisanship over the new Pa. legislative maps | Opinion

The new state legislative maps will determine who has political power in Pennsylvania for the next 10 years. For too long, the borders of these maps have often used gerrymandering to split communities of color, preventing them from forming a voting bloc whose voices must be heard. This robs these communities of the resources and power that they deserve and contributes to generational cycles of poverty.

» READ MORE: Is the new Pa. House map better for Democrats or Republicans? We tested it.

People of color have represented almost the entirety of population growth in the commonwealth over the past 10 years. Pennsylvania’s Asian population grew by 46% between 2010 and 2020, according to U.S. Census data, and its Hispanic population grew by nearly 40%. According to our analyses, communities of color account for roughly 27.5% of Pennsylvania’s total population.

And yet, as of 2020, our state’s highest lawmaking body — the General Assembly — was 90% white.

At Pennsylvania Voice, our goal is to build a more inclusive democracy, so throughout the redistricting process, we and our statewide partner organizations have consistently argued that the new state legislative maps must be drawn with racial equity as a core consideration.

We and our partners have testified at multiple public hearings about the effort to redraw our legislative maps. After gathering input from 700 members of Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) communities across Pennsylvania, we developed a series of Unity Maps, in which we propose eight House district maps in five counties that have experienced a large growth in residents of color, with lines drawn that keep these communities together. We’ve also advocated for an end to the sinister practice known as “prison gerrymandering,” in which incarcerated people, who are disproportionately from BIPOC communities, are counted in the largely white communities of their prison location, instead of their home communities. Thankfully, earlier this year, the Legislative Reapportionment Committee, which is in charge of redrawing legislative maps, largely ended this discriminatory practice.

On Dec. 16, the committee released a draft set of new House and Senate district maps for the state. We were pleased to see that the maps demonstrated a commitment to ensuring that Pennsylvania’s rapidly growing Black, Latino, and Asian American populations will have a greater opportunity to elect candidates that truly represent them over the course of the next 10 years. (And our initial impressions suggest the committee took our Unity Maps into consideration.)

But it was disheartening to see House Republicans disingenuously attack Mark Nordenberg, the committee’s chair, by suggesting, with zero evidence, that he drew these maps to favor Democrats as retaliation against them. These accusations of partisanship serve as a distraction from the real problem: The inability of the growing populations of people of color to elect the candidates of their choice for the last 30 years.

“These accusations of partisanship serve as a distraction from the real problem: The inability of the growing populations of people of color to elect the candidates of their choice for the last 30 years.”

As Nordenberg himself said of these patently false claims, “Typically, when people resort to arguments of that type, it means that they have little to say about the merits of the dispute.” In fact, a recent analysis showed that the new map still favors Republican candidates, albeit less than the current map. But that, said Nordenberg, “is a product of the changing demographics.”

We applaud Nordenberg for faithfully serving as a neutral arbiter, instead of playing politics with the immense responsibility that was bestowed upon him.

There is still time for Pennsylvanians to make their voices heard to ensure that voters will be able to choose their elected officials, instead of the other way around. The process to submit comments on the proposed maps is open until Jan. 18, and we encourage all Pennsylvanians to do so.

For too long, Pennsylvania’s legislative maps have unfairly denied the commonwealth’s BIPOC communities the power to elect the representation to which they are entitled. We continue to advocate for the basic fairness that must be the foundation of any true democracy.

Salewa Ogunmefun is the executive director of Pennsylvania Voice, a partnership of 44-plus organizations working together to expand power for Black, Indigenous, and communities of color across the commonwealth.