Summary of Oral Arguments to Special Redistricting Panel

On January 4, 2022, the Minnesota Special Redistricting Court Panel heard oral arguments from the parties in the ongoing Wattson v. Simon redistricting litigation. The Panel heard arguments from each party about their proposed redistricting maps, as well as criticisms of other parties’ proposed maps. Four parties presented congressional and legislative plans: Wattson plaintiffs (nonpartisan on behalf of all voters), Sachs plaintiffs (on behalf of DFL-affiliated voters), Anderson plaintiffs (on behalf of GOP-affiliated voters), and Corrie (on behalf of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color voters). The Office of the Secretary of State also briefly made oral arguments as well, although it did not submit any plans to the court.

Wattson Plaintiffs

The Wattson plaintiffs include Peter Wattson, a nationally recognized redistricting expert and former nonpartisan legal counsel for the Minnesota Senate; Joe Mansky, a retired election official with decades of expertise in election administration in Minnesota; several Minnesota voters; and the League of Women Voters Minnesota. The Wattson plaintiffs argued that their maps would make the most sense to voters. We argued that the plans attempted to united urbanized populations, rather than crack them apart into multiple districts. We also attempted to maximize the ability of minority voters to elect representatives of their choice, and we attempted to unite American Indian reservations for better representation. And finally, we attempted to unify communities along major transportation corridors.

The Wattson plan tied with the Corrie plan for the most number of minority opportunity districts in the senate (10), and had 21 minority opportunity districts in the house. For example, the plan intentionally attempts to preserve the ethnic and racial minority communities in the Cedar-Riverside and Phillips neighborhoods in Minneapolis. In contrast, the Anderson plaintiffs, for example, split the Cedar-Riverside community into six House districts.

The Wattson plaintiffs were also critical of the Anderson approach of drawing senate districts, which unnecessarily paired second-ring suburbs with third-ring suburbs/exurbs, rather than pairing them with other second-ring suburbs. This appeared to be an attempt to create a Republican gerrymander. Likewise, the Wattson plaintiffs were critical of the Sachs plaintiffs for pairing second-ring suburbs with first-ring suburbs and urban neighborhoods for the same reason that it created a DFL gerrymander. In contrast, the Wattson plaintiffs tried to pair first-ring suburbs with other first-ring suburbs, second-ring suburbs with other second-ring suburbs, and third-ring suburbs with other third-ring suburbs or exurbs. The rational for doing so was because these communities experience population and economic growth in similar ways and were more convenient.

The Wattson plaintiffs highlighted two important goals of their congressional plan. First that the contiguous portions of American Indian reservations in northern Minnesota be entirely in one congressional district. The Wattson map placed the contiguous portions of the American Indian reservations in the same congressional district while respecting the boundaries between agricultural interests in the west and timber and tourism interests in the east based on information from the Department of Employment and Economic Development. Second, a congressional plan should split the St. Cloud area into as few congressional districts as possible, if at all. The Anderson plaintiffs, in contrast, split the St. Cloud into multiple congressional districts.

Anderson Plaintiffs

The Anderson plaintiffs focused on the fact that their plans split the fewest number of political subdivisions (counties, cities, and townships). They also explained that because approximated 5/8ths of the population of Minnesota resides in the 11-county metro area and St. Cloud area, 5 of the 8 congressional districts should reflect populations from urban and suburban voters, with the remaining 3 representing Greater Minnesota. They criticized the Sachs and Corrie congressional plans for adding suburban areas of the state to the more rural congressional districts, arguing that it diluted the rural vote in Minnesota. They also noted that the Wattson plaintiffs took a 5-3 approach, but argued that we extended the 8th congressional district too far to the west and split too many political subdivisions.

The Anderson plaintiffs also made the explicit decision to split cities rather than townships in order to minimize the number of township splits. They split zero townships, whereas the Wattson plaintiffs split 12, the Sachs plaintiffs split 16, and the Corrie plaintiffs split 53. They spent a significant portion of their argument favoring rural interests of Minnesota.

The Anderson plaintiffs criticized the Sachs plaintiffs’ 2nd congressional district, which crossed the Minnesota River twice, first to add Richfield and Bloomington, and then again to add portions of the St. Croix River Valley, splitting that community of interest in two. It criticized these changes, as well as changes to the 4th and 5th congressional districts, as being motivated by partisan gerrymandering. They criticized the Corrie plaintiffs’ plan for making significant changes that moved political subdivisions from the 4th and 5th congressional district into the 3rd congressional district. The Corrie plaintiffs argue that this change increases representation for minority voters, but the Anderson plaintiffs argued there was no significant difference in opportunity for representation from this change.

The Anderson plaintiffs argued that communities of interest should not be elevated above the preservation of political subdivisions and against the idea that voting precincts should be preserved when possible. They also argued that the Wattson plaintiffs should not have analyzed other parties’ plans for partisan gerrymandering and should not have used data analysis to prove that the Wattson maps were not drawn with partisan intent.

Sachs Plaintiffs

The Sachs plaintiffs begun by arguing that the border between the 7th and 8th congressional districts should not move either east or west, but that both districts, in order to pick up population to reach population equality, should move south. They also argued that the 2nd congressional district should contract eastward, away from the rural southwest Minnesota, and expand northward into the suburbs.

For their legislative maps, the Sachs plaintiffs spend a good portion of their oral arguments describing their minority opportunity districts (9 senate districts and 24 house districts). The Sachs plaintiffs also argued that while they did split more political subdivisions than the Anderson plaintiffs, that there was not substantially different numbers, with the Anderson plaintiffs preserving only 1% more of Minnesota’s political subdivisions, all of them being townships. Therefore, they argued, the political subdivision splits should be judged not merely by the number of splits, the rationale for the splits. For example, the Sachs plaintiffs argued that preserving communities of interest justified some splits. They also argued that the Anderson plaintiffs diluted minority voting representation in certain districts.

Like the Anderson plaintiffs, they argued that the Wattson plaintiffs should not have analyzed other parties’ plans for partisan gerrymandering and should not have used data analysis to prove that the Wattson maps were not drawn with partisan intent.

Unlike the Anderson plaintiffs, the Sachs plaintiffs urged the court not to use a “least change” approach, like they had in every previous cycle. They argued that it while it allowed for population equality, it did not address significant changes in demographics over the decade, and it urged the court to take a more active policy-making approach to drawing new maps with more significant changes.

Corrie Plaintiffs

The Corrie plaintiffs focused primarily on the growth of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) populations in Minnesota over the last decade. They also argued that the court had already rejected a “least changed” approach the drawing new maps, although they did not cite any court order stating such. They pushed back against criticisms that their 8th congressional district was too expansive of a change that did not reflect the differences between western and eastern Minnesota, citing the desire to unite all contiguous and non-contiguous American Indian reservations in northern Minnesota. Like the Sachs plaintiffs, the Corrie plaintiffs also argued that southwestern and southeastern Minnesota should be split into two different congressional districts.

For legislative plans, the Corrie plaintiffs emphasized that they created the most number of minority opportunity districts. For example, the Corrie plaintiffs united the three Ojibwe reservations in north-central Minnesota into a single house districting with an American Indian minority voting age population of 25%. They argued that they split the fewest number of political subdivisions, although there was disagreement among the parties about this fact. The reports from the nonpartisan Legislative Coordinating Commission shows that the Corrie plaintiffs have the largest number of political subdivision splits. The Corrie plaintiffs argued that where there were splits, they were justified by preserving communities of interest.

The Corrie plaintiffs explicitly asked the court to reject the idea of creating a map with a 5-3 configuration (5 metro/suburb districts and 3 rural districts).

Secretary of State

The secretary of state’s office did not present a plan or provide specific criticisms of any other party’s proposed plans. It did, however, note for the court that the preservation of political subdivisions is important because it minimizes the costs of election administration for counties, cities, and townships. They argued that creating new or additional precincts greatly increases the costs of election administration because additional voting machines, staff, and materials are required for each new precinct.

Concluding Remarks

At the end of the oral arguments, presiding Judge Louise D. Bjorkman emphasized that the authority to draw new maps remained with the legislature. But, in the event that the legislature failed to pass maps by February 15, 2022, the panel would issue maps on that date.

The parties’ proposed congressional and legislative plans, as well as plans draw by legislators, can be found on the legislature’s website. The five-and-a-half hour recording of the oral argument can be found on the Minnesota Judicial Branch’s YouTube page.