But gerrymandering is also blamed too much for too many things — especially for our political polarization and for Republicans’ strong advantage in the House. Just last week, an op-ed in The Washington Post blamed gerrymandering for breeding the conservative Freedom Caucus, which thwarted the GOP health-care bill.
Some new data from the Cook Political Report shows how overwrought this is.
In their report debuting Cook’s famous Partisan Voting Index (PVI) ratings for all 435 House districts, David Wasserman and Ally Flinn also reflect upon the decline of the swing district. Twenty years ago, 164 districts had a PVI of between Republican +5 and Democratic +5 — basically what you’d consider a swing district. Today, it’s less than half of that: just 72 districts.