Latinos may not see gains in power
Redistricting might not change AZ political map
Over the past 10 years, the Latino population in Arizona grew faster than any other group in the state and by nearly double that of white people.
The growth created optimism among many in the Latino community that the state’s political map would change and lead to more Latinos winning elected office. But so far, it appears the once-a-decade redrawing of districts for officeholders won’t end with any dramatic increase in Latino representation in Arizona — and perhaps no increase at all.
Latinos likely will end up with the clout to elect favored candidates in two out of nine congressional districts — the same as it’s been since 2010. In the state Legislature, the number of districts with a majority of Latinos might increase to eight from seven out of 30.
For the next decade, that appears the most that could change.
“These are the dilemmas we are looking at,” said Danny Ortega, a Phoenix lawyer who worked with the Latino Coalition for Fair Redistricting on their efforts to create maps that would maximize the state’s Latino and Democratic power. “We did the best we could, understanding that the numbers aren’t as good as we like. It’s the best we could get.”
While “it is exciting to take the opportunity to try to make a difference for the communities that feel they’re underrepresented,” Ortega said, “it’s also a lot of work.”
Democratic Latino leaders, politicos and mapping experts started planning last year for the 2021 redistricting process. Aided by funding from the BOLD PAC, a project of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus that seeks to get more representatives of color elected, the Latino Coalition in Arizona created maps and helped get people involved in the state’s once-a-decade redrawing of political maps.
“We did the best we could, understanding that the numbers aren’t as good as we like.”
Danny Ortega
Phoenix lawyer
They submitted those maps last month to the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, the five-person panel that ultimately will decide how the state’s new political lines will look.
But politics and demographic realities make it difficult for the coalition to reach its goal of increased representation.
“I’ll have to look at the final math, but I want to make sure that in terms of the state Legislature, that we’re properly represented and there’s enough Latino districts for the growth that happened in the Latino population,” said U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., chair of the BOLD PAC, which is also helping with redistricting efforts in other states. The PAC’s funding for Arizona was a “six-figure investment,” he said.
The PAC’s secondary goal is to increase Democrats’ power. Latinos already tend to vote Democratic and went for President Joe Biden over former President Donald Trump nationally in 2020 by 59% to 38%, according to a Pew Research Center survey. In Arizona, Latinos chose Biden and rejected Trump by a greater margin, 63% to 36%.
“If Latinos are given proper opportunity to elect the people that they choose ... when it comes to that type of situation, then Democrats will gain from that,” Gallego said.
Revisions of draft congressional and legislative maps approved by the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission will start Dec. 6 in “final decision meetings,” which follow several more planned hearings and town halls where the commissioners are collecting public input.
Whether the Democratic Latino Coalition’s efforts have an effect won’t be known for certain until the five-member redistricting commission finalizes and approves the new political maps.
Arizonans still have a few weeks to weigh in. The commission set a goal of Dec. 22 to vote on the final maps, but Jan. 2 is considered the last optimal date to ensure smooth elections with the new districts next year.
The districts’ shapes and demographic palette could change drastically after the deliberations and revisions begin.
Why growth doesn’t equal change
The main obstacles to increased Latino representation are math and geography.
The way the process works, the total state population is divided by the number of districts, and each district’s population has to be roughly equal. Despite the fast growth of Latinos in Arizona, their share of the state’s population hasn’t changed much, going from 29.6% in the 2010 census to 30.7% in 2020.
White people’s share of the state population fell from 57.8% to 53.4% during the same time.
The math could lead to an assumption that there would be more Latinomajority legislative districts: 30% of 30 legislative districts is nine. But Latinos, who are made up mostly of Mexican Americans in Arizona, are more numerous in certain parts of the state, like west Phoenix and the southwest Valley, Tucson and Yuma, and less in others, which concentrates their political power.
“It would take some amount of gerrymandering to increase the legislative number beyond seven or eight and the congressional number to three,” said Tom Rex, associate director of Arizona State University’s Center for Competitiveness and Prosperity Research.
One legislative district among the 30 is currently majority-Native American, and there will still be one after redistricting because of the relatively low population of Arizona’s Native Americans, whose share of the state’s population dropped from 4% to 3.7% over the past 10 years.
The percentage of Black people in Arizona saw strong growth in the past decade, going from 3.7% to 4.4%, for a total of 339,150 residents. Asian American residents also grew in number, to 213,417, the census showed. But the populations of both groups are currently too small and spread out to make up more than half of a single, non-gerrymandered Legislative district, which must have a minimum of 238,383 people. Achieving 50% of a congressional district, which requires 794,611 residents,
isn’t mathematically possible for either group.
The 2020 census also didn’t show enough population gain for the state to qualify for a 10th congressional district, which possibly could have led to a third Latino-dominant congressional district. Some worry that the census undercounted Latinos in particular, which will negatively affect Latino political power for the next decade.
As is, the population increase simply won’t warrant a third congressional district with a majority of Latino voters, Ortega said. Whether the redistricting commission can meet the Democratic Latino group’s goal of eight Latino-majority legislative districts while remaining within legal guidelines is still unknown, he said.
Demographers on the coalition’s team submitted their proposed congressional and legislative maps to the redistricting commission in October, he said, noting the complex adjustments that must be made in the map lines to ensure the proposed district and those it affects are legally compliant.
It may be that getting to eight legislative districts isn’t feasible while trying to adhere to other mandatory criteria, like keeping communities of interest together, striving for competitive districts and complying with the federal Voting Rights Act.
If the maps can comply with legal criteria for eight districts but are rejected by the commission, it could be necessary to “litigate,” Ortega said.
The League of United Latin American Citizens, a national Latino empowerment group whose Arizona chapter also worked with the Latino Coalition, sued the state of Texas last month over a redistricting plan that allegedly shortchanges Latinos, reducing the number of Latino-dominant districts to seven from eight.
Balancing legal risks with maps
Derrick Watchman, a member of the Navajo Nation and the one person of color on the redistricting commission, told The Arizona Republic he would “love to see more opportunities for our minority communities to have candidates of choice.”
“Our demographics are changing, the different areas are growing, so it makes sense to have an elected body that’s representative of our people,” he said.
Expanded representation depends on the “numbers,” he said, and commission staff ’s analysis of the adopted draft maps’ compliance with the Arizona Constitution, the Voting Rights Act, adherence to keeping communities of interest together and other criteria.
The redistricting commission rebuffed the eight-district legislative plan last month while giving preference to the idea of a new Republican-leaning district supported by a southern Arizona business group.
The commission’s demographic analysis of the Latino groups’ plan, published on its website, also shows flaws in the eight-district proposal. It creates an eighth Latino-favoring legislative district, which would swing strongly Democrat, in part from borrowing the Latino population from other Latino
districts. That waters down the citizen voting-age population of six of those districts.
Additionally, the plan would result in only three competitive districts statewide in which Republicans or Democrats could theoretically win. The redistricting commission’s adopted legislative draft map, now under review by the public, has six. According to the state Constitution, the criteria of competitiveness must be considered but cannot create “significant detriment to other goals.”
An Oct. 20 letter the coalition sent to the redistricting commission states that the districts would remain robust Latino strongholds and the plan would comply with the Voting Rights Act. But there are risks, as the redistricting commission’s independent chair Erika Neuberg told The Republic’s political podcast The Gaggle in an episode earlier this month.
“From a legal lens of mitigating risk, if you lean in too much and you go eight, without being compelled to do so, you’re at the risk of being accused of racial gerrymandering — giving certain groups preferential treatment,” she said.
At the same time, a map that dilutes some districts enough so they possibly won’t perform well for the Latino community would put the redistricting commission at “double-risk” of a legal challenge, she said. “Our job is to find that sweet spot that maximizes and empowers the Latino community as much as possible while mitigating legal risk.”
At one of the final decision meetings, the commission’s mapping team could present a way to incorporate eight Latino districts while still managing to adhere as close as possible to the other criteria. But the ripple effects may still cause problems that prevent the two Republican commissioners from getting what they want.
As the final maps come into form, “we’ve got some compromising to do,” Watchman said.
The need for more representation
The Latino coalition’s plan may dilute some of the Latino districts’ power, but the adopted draft maps also would strip power from Latinos in other areas, according to Tomas Robles, co-executive director of Living United for Change in Arizona, a progressive nonprofit.
He said he would tolerate some dilution in return for another solid Latino district. From Robles’ point of view, many Latino residents are troubled by the state’s “de-investment” from the school system at the same time incarceration increases. The current Republican majority in the Legislature ignores issues that affect Latino communities such as “over-policing” and the lack of shade in certain neighborhoods while it’s also coming up with “anti-voter measures,” he said.
“An added district gives us an opportunity to find representation in other parts of the state,” he said. “Not getting the right representation (means) people are not getting the resources the Legislature won’t address.”
He said he’s concerned that the way the official congressional draft map indicates the current District 1, which encompasses
much of Arizona’s tribal lands, would be much less competitive for Democrats, and therefore people of color. He noted that U.S. Rep. Tom O’Halleran won the district against Republican Tiffany Shedd by only 10,000 votes in 2020.
“For folks that align with what the Democratic Party stands for, it would become a Republican stronghold,” he said.
The commission’s adopted draft map also would move some people in the West Valley out of Rep. Raúl Grijalva’s congressional district and either to Gallego’s new, safe-for-Democrats 3rd District or a new 5th District that leans Republican. Overall, Republicans likely would outnumber Democrats 5-4 in the draft congressional districts; the split currently runs the other way.
Republicans and the Latino vote
Litchfield Park Mayor Thomas Schoaf, who has closely observed the redistricting process, urged voters to get involved by going to the commission’s website, finding the draft maps and learning how their own communities may be affected. But he has a “real big problem with identifying a community of interest” solely by nationality or ethnicity.
Litchfield Park is majority white, but it has the same issues as majority Latino areas nearby, he said. Those include transportation, education and managing growth.
“As ethnic balances change, it may drive changes in political outcomes,” he said. “I’m not sure the issues change dramatically.”
Latinos cannot be easily categorized as voters, despite their tendency to vote Democratic in Arizona. In a large survey of Arizona Latinos conducted in 2015, 39% identified as somewhat or very conservative, while only 25% identified as liberal.
Reymundo Torres, spokesperson for the Arizona Latino Republican Association, said he’d like to see more Latino representatives — but with an “R” in front of their names. Although Latino support for Trump increased in Arizona from estimates of 31% in the 2016 election to 36% in 2020, Torres is worried for the future of his party.
“The Mexican American population in Arizona is the key to future success or failure of the party,” he said. “If we don’t do more than show up as backdrops to existing Anglo candidates, the future narrative is going to create itself.”
Republican Latino political power has waned since the death of Sen. John McCain, who was a “center of gravity” for fundraising and volunteers, Torres said. He laments how 10 legislative races in Arizona went without Republican competitors and says the GOP should field more candidates in those races who “look like the community.” He added, “What do you have to lose?”
The next independent redistricting commission draft map hearing will be 6 p.m. Nov. 30 in the Avondale City Council chambers, 11465 W. Civic Center Drive in Avondale, and will be livestreamed. The public meeting schedule is available at https://irc.az.gov/publicmeetings/draft-map-hearings.