As a corollary to that, any attempt to redistrict out AOC is at best going to be a short-term strategy even if successful. All she has to do is to move to a more liberal district in NYC the next time around and she’s likely to be elected from there.
Regarding the fundraising: the House leadership has fundraising expectations from every member regardless of how safe their seat is. I big chunk of time is spent on the phones contacting donors.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think there’s a Constitutional requirement to live in the district you represent - you just have to live in the state. I don’t think that any further qualifications are allowed by the state, given that term limit restrictions are not allowed. I seem to recall reading about at least one Congresscritter who after redistricting no longer lived in the district it made most sense for him to run in given the overlap with his previous district. Now, clearly it’s a good idea to run in the district you live in, but I think it’s not a deal-breaker.
You are correct – a Representative must live in their state, but is not required to live in the district. Politically, candidates almost always live in or move to the district prior to running.
And unlike others in this thread, I’m not as convinced that, if her district got carved up, AOC could just waltz through a primary in a newly-configured district. Jose Serrano is retiring after this Congress to be replaced by Ritchie Torres, and Elliot Engel got knocked off by Jamal Bowman, so all three Bronx-based districts will be represented next year by young, progressive politicians. Forcing any two of them into a primary against each other would be painful for NY progressives. AOC would have some great advantages due to her profile and fundraising, but it would get ugly.
True. You’d probably end up having to take the current 16th altogether outside the Bronx and displace it northward to be fully in Westchester Co. .
(Note: spellcheck just tried to tell me the borough name is “Brinks”. Oy…)
The estimate right now is that NY will lose two districts, with the possibility of losing three if the results are worse than anticipated. What districts get merged would have to depend on where people were at the time the census forms were returned, that is, where was there relative growth and loss. As of 2019 depending on where you reference, the urban counties esp Brooklyn/Bronx/Queens were relatively up vs. the upstate rural counties relatively down – but rural upstate is already very consolidated. Eleven of the 27 existing districts are entirely or mostly inside the 5 boroughs so it is virtually inevitable that one of the consolidations will have to happen in NYC/Long Island and not out of the question that both may be downstate. This time around NY will be using the Bipartisan Commission method of redistricting.
If the upstate areas are down in population, that’s where they’re going to have to consolidate. Doesn’t matter how consolidated it already is. If they consolidate where the population is up, they’ll have unequal numbers of voters in each district, which violates the basic rule of redistricting.
I think it’s likely, if AOC’s district is changed, that she’d make a deal with the other Reps about who gets to run for Senate or governor next time the office is open. With her communications talent, which I think might compare to Barack Obama (not sure yet, but I’m hopeful), she’ll be Senator out governor someday, and maybe even more.
I think you’re completely wrong . AOC would be crushed in a Senate primary. Schumer is running for one more term (unless the Dems don’t take the Senate this year). Gillibrand to the cabinet is so far just vague rumors and I don’t see it.
We’ll see. Young as she is, she has nowhere to go but up, and she appears very willing to learn. I think she’s just enormously talented. Those who despise her may be unwilling or unable to see such talent.
And she has very good political skills. She saw the race was swinging towards Biden and started building bridges toward the middle, which got other Sanders surrogates really, really pissed at her, but it was the smart thing to do (and Sanders should have done it).
Right. And she’s only 30. How smart and savvy is she going to be when she’s 40 and 50?
With a decade or so of calmly roasting those empty suits sitting across the aisle from her.
She’s smart and tough and enormously popular with two generations of voters who will only increase in numbers and influence in the near future. There’s a reason that the GOP noise machine is painting her as the debbil incarnate: they’re scared to death of her.
Twitter noise doesn’t equal popularity. Her career will be capped as a gadfly Representative as far away from House leadership as possible. I don’t see people wanting to watch her dance or cook these days on Instagram.
No, they seem to want to watch her craft important legislation, hold a highly sought after endorsement, and speak on a national stage. It seems to be working out for everyone.
You seem to be unaware of the demographic and political shifts underway. As her age cohort in the population becomes older, the positions she currently has are going to more and more part of the mainstream.
Again, I have no particular reason to think that the legislature and Governor would try to target AOC or NYC districts in particular, but there are all kinds of games they can play to marry up high population areas with lower population areas and still come up with equal districts. They could come up with a district that runs from AOC’s house to Lake Placid via the Buffalo suburbs. Look at Maryland’s Third or Florida’s Fifth for prime examples.
It may not, sure. But AOC is popular in ways well beyond Twitter. Her opposition has helped make her more popular by constantly addressing her.
For these other young progressives to out her, I have to ask: do they have the name recognition and popularity? Do they have the Republicans utterly freaked out about her existence enough to constantly address her as the largest threat to them?
The reason she is so popular on Twitter is because she’s so popular elsewhere. And popularity and name recognition matter a lot, especially when comparing candidates with similar values.
Plus, if she loses to a progressive candidate, then she’s losing to someone I would be just as happy with, and that you likely would be just as upset at. Her importance as an individual is, IMHO, overblown. It’s just her being a feisty, fiery progressive (and possibly being a non-white younger woman in a world tired of old, white men running things) that has made her as prominent as she is. If there’s a more effective progressive out there that can replace her, then more power to them.
I’m sure this time it’s different and all the younger people who didn’t show up to vote for Bernie are going to change the world and all, but I’ll believe it when I see it.
I don’t think you understand what I am saying. The political center changes over time. What appear to be radical positions now are going to become more mainstream in the future. Of course, the New Deal was radical socialism when it was new. Now many of its programs and ideas are mainstream. I think that will become the case with ideas like the Green New Deal as well.
And I think you’re wrong. Yes same sex marriage and social issues have moved quickly, but the GND is an unfunny joke and AOC should have spent more time in her economics classes.
The GND is going nowhere in this upcoming congress.