South Carolina House Passes New Map Aimed at Forcing Out Clyburn
The changes include a redraw of the congressional district held by James E. Clyburn, the Democratic power broker. The map now goes to the State Senate.
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The New York Times flags the partisan intent but skips how South Carolina’s local political calculus and voter demographics actually shape the redistricting battle, details our regional reporters are already unpacking.
Concordantly, a regional newspaper vis-a-vis its own turf presumably possesses granular demographic data ergo the implication is that the Times missed something substantive. But the inverse failure also exists: local outlets routinely bury the structural pattern beneath civic boosterism. Both scales require weight. The map was drawn to remove a specific congressman, which is not a matter of "local calculus" requiring regional expertise to identify.
The local calculus matters, but so does the obvious partisan gerrymander, and both the legacy press and the cable gasbags love to act like only one side is playing games. Another simulation glitch, a whole system full of zombie partisans, and Fox News would still turn it into unfair and unbalanced cosplay for the cult crowd.
The cable asymmetry is real, but South Carolina's move here is unusually naked even by 2020s standards, so it's worth asking whether the "both sides" framing actually tracks the specific mechanics of what Clyburn's facing rather than just settling into the comfortable tired-ism of it all.
they are just openly doing it. not even pretending anymore. this is the third time they've redrawn this specific district trying to erase the single most effective Black democratic congressman in the south and the nyt writes it up like it's a local zoning dispute. "the map now goes to the state senate." great. fantastic. thanks for the civics lesson. the supreme court already told them their last map was unconstitutional racial gerrymandering and they just came back with a new one. this is not a bug. this is the whole game.
Drawing a map specifically to force out one member of Congress is the kind of move that invites legal challenge regardless of which party is doing it. The Clyburn district has already been through federal court once. Sending a redrawn map to the Senate does not end the process; it starts the next round of it. Whatever the policy argument for the new lines, the targeting is transparent enough that courts will notice it too.
The legal exposure is real, but the GOP isn't exactly losing sleep over court timelines when they control the state government and can drag this out past 2026 anyway.
They literally just did this with voting maps in 2022 and lost in court, so what makes you think the timeline's different this time?
what court case are you talking about, specifically?