The release of the latest Census results revealed Republican-leaning states gaining congressional seats while some key democratic strongholds lost seats going into the crucial 2022 midterm elections.
Colorado, Florida, Montana, North Carolina and Oregon will each gain one seat in Congress.California, Illinois, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia will all lose congressional seats ahead of the 2022 midterm elections.
The results are a clear sign that political power in America is moving away from states in the Midwest and Northeast to those in the South and the West. Gaining or losing a seat of representation in Congress has a huge impact on a state’s financial resources and its power. Some of the results came down to less than a hundred people. That’s how New York lost a congressional seat.
Something else the census numbers reflect is the states that are gaining residents and in relation, power. Colorado, Florida, North Carolina and Texas gaining seats and electoral votes means their political importance will increase over the next decade. That will come at the expense of states like Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan. Which means that under the redrawn map, Joe Biden would have still won the presidency, but by a smaller margin.
Noted pollster Dave Wasserman of The Cook Political Report thinks the census results were actually good news for Democrats, given that it was expected some red states would pick up more seats.
This is a slightly smaller seat shift than expected. The big winners: AL, MN and RI keep their current seats and breathe a huge sight of relief. NY avoids losing a second seat.
AZ misses out on gaining a seat. TX and FL each gain one less seat than expected.
— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) April 26, 2021
The once-a-decade survey also showed that aging, less immigration and the after-effects of the Great Recession are having an impact on America’s population growth, which declined to the lowest rate seen since The Great Depression. California losing a congressional seat for the first time in its 170-year history is seen as proof of slowing migration to the nation’s biggest state.