UPDATED: Draft of IL Congressional Remap Published in Crain’s on Sunday May 16 was a Dave Wasserman Map Version Dated April 30

Dave Wasserman

From the desk of John Lopez: Version control prompts an example of “fake news”

All right, I will admit, I gave Crain’s Chicago Business Greg Hinz too much credit without questioning his Sunday afternoon congressional remap complete with a “draft map” with discernment.

The above map was taken from an April 30 tweet by Cook Political Report‘s U.S. House Editor Dave Wasserman. Here is the tweet:

Do the maps in the above tweet look familiar? They should, it’s the exact same map published in Crain’s Sunday afternoon by political reporter Greg Hinz.

Back on April 1st, McHenry County Blog published an article sourced from Cook Political Report‘s U.S. House Editor Dave Wasserman’s inside information about a “semi-swap” map with the IL-11 and IL-14 being swapped.

What I did not know until last night, Wasserman had updated the original “semi-swap” map dated March 12 with the above version of “semi-swap” dated April 30, which Wasserman tweeted after IL-17 Congresswoman Cheri Bustos (D) announced her retirement from Congress, as reported on April 30.

Until last night, I did not know Wasserman tweeted a revised April 30 map, which is different from March 12, particularly with McHenry County, being a part of a new IL-11 in March, but on April 30, the IL-08 had replaced the original IL-11.

Therefore, outside of Sunday’s Crain’s report, no maps have been obtained that the Democrats are drawing, either for congressional districts or Illinois General Assembly, and the Daily Herald‘s Saturday afternoon story, focusing solely on the General Assembly districts, have area lawmakers all saying no maps were drawn.

I will do better to use discernment, even with stories from credible journalists. The output from the Democrats’ Map Room is still secret.

Guess it’s time to relive some 40-year old Indiana Jones in the Map Room.

====================================

The first leaked working map of the congressional remap the Democrats in Springfield are working appears to confirm Wasserman’s sources were accurate back in March, with many of the components being applied, but with a significant twist for McHenry County, if this is the final map.

Neither of the current Members of the U.S. House representing McHenry County will be up for election for McHenry County voters in 2022.

Instead, McHenry County being divided among the heavily Democratic 8th, 9th and 10th Congressional Districts.

Source: Crain’s Chicago Business, McHenry County outlined by McHenry County Blog

While this map excerpt published in Crain’s Chicago Business over the weekend is far from the final, as POLITICO‘s Shia Kapos explained, it does tell what state legislators (Democrats only) are thinking. Impacts to McHenry County:

  • IL-06 (Sean Casten) completely removed from Algonquin Township in McHenry County and from northern Kane County. Moving west into central Kane County to absorb Campton and Blackberry townships, all of St. Charles Township and northwest corner of Geneva Township away from IL-14, and moving further east into Cook County including the city of Chicago
  • IL-14 (Lauren Underwood) completely removed from McHenry County, and “swapped” with Congressman Bill Foster’s IL-11 taking in more of her Will County Democratic base, and absorbing current IL-16, while keeping Kendall County, but including the city of Aurora in both Kendall and Will counties away from IL-11. Underwood loses all of DuPage County, including her main field office in West Chicago. Im addition to McHenry and DuPage counties, her new district loses all of Lake, Kane and the Sycamore portion of DeKalb counties.
  • IL-08 (Raja Krishnamoorthi) gains most of rural northwest McHenry County, plus all of the cities of Woodstock and Harvard, plus all of the village of Huntley. In Kane County, gains the remaining portion of Dundee Township, plus all of Rutland and Hampshire townships.
  • IL-09 (Jan Schakowsky) gains all of McHenry and Nunda townships, plus most of Algonquin Township, including significant portions of the city of Crystal Lake
  • IL-10 (Brad Schneider) enters McHenry County, claiming Richmond, Burton and Hebron townships
  • Both IL-14 Democratic State Central Committeepersons, Paul Janko and Kristina Zahorik drawn out of IL-14 completely. Republican State Central Committeeperson Laura Pollastrini (Hampshire) also drawn out of IL-14. For all three to retain their spots on the respective state central committees, they must seek reelection in different districts, Janko and Pollastrini in IL-08, Zahorik in IL-09

Here’s the statewide draft map as reported by Crain’s:

Source: Crain’s Chicago Business 5/16/21

All reminded, this is a “working map” and far from final.

That said, it looks like commenter Correcting got what they shared with state Representative Suzanne Ness (D, Crystal Lake) — the IL-16 of Congressman Adam Kinzinger is eliminated, so the Adam Kinzinger vs. Catalina Lauf primary is finished.

What both Kinzinger and Lauf do in 2022 remains to be seen, with Kinzinger having the option to run for the U.S. Senate (Lauf doesn’t turn 30 until May of 2023, so not old enough to run for Senate next year).

External references:

  • Crain’s Chicago Business article of May 16 can be viewed here
  • POLITICO Illinois Playbook of May 17 with congressional remap news can be viewed here


Comments

UPDATED: Draft of IL Congressional Remap Published in Crain’s on Sunday May 16 was a Dave Wasserman Map Version Dated April 30 — 12 Comments

  1. Cal,

    Can we get an overlayo on the proposed county board districts?

    Show us where each current board member lives and which proposed district they will represent.

  2. I know you didn’t make the graphic but those people from that website are dumb.

    Blurry picture
    No labels on districts
    Content itself is behind paywall

    Even with your descriptions, it’s hard to make sense of this. Schneider has the pink one in the corner, Raja has the purple one, and Schakowski has that light blue one?

    This is one WACKY map.

    I can make out some things on this map. Not entirely useless, but not good by any stretch of the imagination.

    Do better, Crain’s.

    Hopefully someone puts up a map that is easier to interpret.

    Hard to make analysis on the political implications of these new districts when one can’t make sense of the map.

    What is that green district that’s in Kankakee and Will County?

    What color is Underwood’s district?

    What color is Casten’s district?

    Which districts are expected to be Democrat vs Republican?

    I heard this is really supposed to gerrymander stuff in Democrats’ favor (Republicans are only supposed to have 3?) but some of the districts in northern Illinois don’t look like locks…

    I count three just with the green one in western Illinois, the blue/purple one in southern Illinois, and the orange one in eastern Illinois (I see Rodney Davis is going to get screwed though).

    Those are the only ones GOP is expected to win?

    idk man, I don’t have all the data in front of me, but I get the feeling Dems are getting too cocky if this is the map.

    Those three districts that are part of the current 16th district (the dark green one in Kankakee County, the brownish-green county to its west that has Kendall County and southern DeKalb County, and that light green one with Boone County — are those supposed to be Democrat?

    I’m not sure about the one that resembles the current 17th. Looks like they tried to clean it up a little for Democrats and it’ll have parts of Rockford, Peoria, and Rock Island, but Bustos isn’t running.

    I’d also like to see a zoomed in map on Cook County closer to Chicago because it’s a total blur on both of these maps.

    Looks like there is still that weird horseshoe looking one (I think that’s the 4th represented by Chuy Garcia).

    Where’s Quigley’s district?

    Where’s Rush?

    Where’s Kelly?

    Where’s Danny Davis?

    What’s that yellow district a bit southeast of McHenry County?

    What’s that blue district a bit south of us?

    What district would we even say was eliminated?

    You could make the case it was Kinzinger’s district, but they totally butchered McHenry County and a lot of the Metro area.

    There’s a lot in this map out in the suburbs that doesn’t resemble anything we currently have.

    My goodness this is an abortion of a map.

    If you drove south (probably on rt 47) look at how many districts you’d go through between McHenry and Kane County.

    You’d even leave one district, go to another, and then re-enter the one you were in before…

    Then we have a district that goes from like Evanston to McHenry.

    smh this is embarrassing.

  3. How can they justify this map?

    You have to be a depraved liberal political hack with no shame to create this map.

    Hmmmm.

    And they wonder why they are so despised.

  4. Thanks for the updated and clearer map at the top of the page, John!

    While it still isn’t totally clear (particularly around the Chicago area), it’s a lot better than the garbage that was previously provided by Crain’s (the image on the bottom).

    For example, in the old picture you can’t tell that the green district in Kankakee and Will actually extends up into Chicago or at least the south suburbs.

    Now I see that’s Robin Kelly’s district and that makes more sense.

    In the new map you can see that the light green 11th district a lot more clearly but in the old one it looks like there is a gap in the district north of Rockford.

    Some of my points in the previous post stand though.

    Are we sure the 14th, 10th (now that I look closer), 8th, 17th, and 11th are safe D districts?

    You also wonder how it’ll change if someone with little name recognition here runs, like Jan Schakowski or Brad Schneider in McHenry County.

    I guess they have a lot of money and that helps.

    It’s still a really bizarre map imo.

    It provides Republicans with fewer safe seats but more opportunities overall and I’m not sure why Dems would want to go that route in a midterm — though I don’t mind Democrats’ hubris costing them the House. 🙂

    I’m not going to comment about my involvement with Sue Ness, the Democrats, Kinzinger’s district, and the map making process because as far as I’m concerned this is still just an idea.

    It’s not finalized.

    I won’t believe it until I see it approved.

    But I will say I approve of, and have pushed for, Kinzinger’s district to be removed.

    The way I see it, the Dems are going to eliminate a Republican district because Illinois is losing a seat and Democrats control redistricting so no duh they’re going to get rid of a Republican district.

    I always figured if we have to get rid of a Republican, it should be Kinzinger.

    Plus, you know I’m not digging his GOP competitors:

    Lauf, Lombardi, Marter, et al.

    Lauf might do ok against Raja if she wants to go down that route but these maps aren’t final so she might want to hold off (more on that in a little bit).

    Is that purple one between 1 and 6 supposed to be the third district?

    That sucks for Rodney Davis (13th – R).

    I kinda figured that would happen though, and I also called that Mike Bost (12 – R) is going to whoop some Democrat butt again which looks accurate.

    I had no idea how badly they would alter the districts in the metro area.

    Like I said, it’s a bizarre map.

    We should entertain the possibility that they leaked this map to get challengers to switch districts — that this is bait to try to get a feel for what Republicans might do.

  5. Totally absurd. Would be nice to have a “neutral” and fair system that both main parties could agree with. Have that system based on software, that both parties agree with, using data, statistics, census information using artificial intelligence somehow.

  6. Bred: I agree totally but the GOP dominated US Supreme Court threw in the towel on policing gerrymandering for political, as opposed to racial, reasons so there is no stopping either party from drawing up whatever they want.

    https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/27/politics/read-supreme-court-partisan-gerrymandering-case/index.html

    Also, if you remember back to when Al Jourdan was the state GOP chairman, the Repbublicans drew an equally ridiculous looking map which divided cities like Waukegan, Elgin, Aurora etc to dilute Democratic strength.

    So it all depends on whose ox is being gored.

    Thanks to the Supremes, there is now zero chance that any meaningful change will take place.

  7. It is always amusing to watch people talk about the mapmaking process that don’t talk to anyone involved in the mapmaking process.

    Hinz got played … and Lopez lapped it up too.

    As for a fair mapmaking process…

    I’ll support any fair Congressional mapmaking process that is used in all 50 states.

    But until then I won’t support IL using a “fair” process when WI and OH and TX (and so on) do not.

  8. That is correct AL Shake.

    This is a national, not just a state issue.

    With more state legislatures in the hands of Republicans than Democrats, the no holds barred gerrymandering will benefit the GOP overall unless Congress takes some sort of action to curb it.

    Even then, however, it would only apply to Congressional districting not state general assemblies.

    So I don’t see any light at the end of this tunnel any time soon, if ever.

  9. Ah yes they know the loss is a coming so lets make sure the Cheat is on….. i will write in if i need to… before i ever elect a Cheater, Liar thief!!!

    We have had enuff…

  10. Who gave this balding ugly “Wasserman” guy the map he posted??

    And if he has access to what Democrats are drawing, even though they are having their meetings in underground tunnels and won’t let members of the press or Republican colleagues inside, where are the maps for the state legislative districts?

    How did the balding ugly “Wasserman” get access to the maps when Republicans in the legislature don’t even know what’s going on?

  11. Try to keep up, correcting.

    Wasserman doesn’t have access to what the Democrats are drawing.

    Wasserman drew that map himself (or had his interns do so).

    Oh, and they’re not drawing them in underground tunnels, but good effort.

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