Soft Revolution Ends Gerrymandering
Under Prop. 20, 14 citizens chosen this month will remake state political map
Jessica Levinson of the Center for Governmental Studies says that under the voter reforms, the citizen commission is likely to create more compact districts that respect community boundaries, adding many or all of the 100,000 Latinos back into Berman's 28th California Congressional District.
Berman then could be challenged by an up-and-coming Latino who lost his or her chance when Berman systematically cleansed his district of Latino voters.
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"He's been safe for a very long time," Levinson says of Berman. "But anybody can be vulnerable when districts are redrawn."
Although the commission won't arbitrarily cut Beverly Hills or Inglewood in half, many districts it designs will still overwhelmingly favor one party. After all, how many East Hollywood, Echo Park and Silver Lake residents voted for Republican John McCain in 2008?
That said, voter passage of Proposition 20 is a historic reversal. California lawmakers no longer have one of their favorite tools: the power to manipulate the electoral landscape to subvert democratic elections.
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