Congressional remapping looms
Much attention will be on paring down 5th District
Last year, in a close race, Oklahoma City Republican Stephanie Bice won the congressional seat Democrat Kendra Horn had held for a single term, and she did it by beating Horn by considerable margins in Pottawatomie and Seminole counties.
Horn actually won the largest part of the 5th Congressional District, Oklahoma County, by a razor thin margin. But Bice won overwhelmingly in the two small counties that are also part of the district.
The Oklahoma Legislature is set to redraw the boundaries of the state’s five congressional districts next month, and much of the attention will be focused on the 5th District, the only one to have a Democratic representative since Dan Boren retired from eastern Oklahoma’s 2nd District after the 2012 elections.
The 5th district must shed about 33,000 people to conform to the 2020 Census results, which require each of the five districts to have 791,871 residents.
Whatever changes are approved will resonate politically for the next decade. Republicans control the redistricting process, and some will want to ensure the 5th District remains Republican, possibly by putting the most Democratic parts of Oklahoma City into another district such as the one that includes most of western Oklahoma farm country. Under that scenario, Oklahoma City city hall would be in the same district as the Panhandle.
“I think anybody who’s saying they know what the map’s going to be — no, they don’t, I don’t even know.” Jon Echols Oklahoma House Majority Floor Leader
Many Democrats will favor a compact district that reflects the diversity of Oklahoma County and is at least politically competitive.
Legislative committees have not unveiled proposals
The legislative committees tasked with drawing new maps for state and federal lawmakers have held public meetings around the state and solicited input, including map submissions. Those committees haven’t proposed their own congressional map. The committees have a meeting scheduled for Tuesday to hear from members of the public who submitted proposals.
Oklahoma House Majority Floor Leader Jon Echols, an Oklahoma City Republican, said he expects a proposed congressional map to be released by legislators at least a week before the special session begins on Nov. 15. The proposal will have to move through both committees before votes in the full House and Senate, he said.
Echols said “rumors were running rampant” about the congressional map but that he hasn’t seen one.
“I think anybody who’s saying they know what the map’s going to be — no, they don’t,” Echols said. “I don’t even know.”
The three members of the congressional delegation who currently represent part of Oklahoma City — Reps. Stephanie Bice, R-Oklahoma City; Tom Cole, RMoore; and Frank Lucas, R-Cheyenne — have declined to respond to specific inquiries in the last two weeks about their own discussions.
Bice said Friday, “The Oklahoma Legislature faced an uphill battle with the redistricting process this year, considering the late delivery of Census Bureau data. While the process is ongoing, it’s important it be fair, transparent and meet all legal requirements. Regardless of the outcome for the 5th district, I look forward to running again and doing my best to represent my constituents and all Oklahomans.”
In an interview in August, Cole said, “I don’t think there will be huge changes. You can do this without overdoing it.”
Cole, who represents the 4th District, which includes a few precincts near Tinker in Oklahoma County and the parts of Oklahoma City that are in Cleveland County, said in August that he and his colleagues had “talked to one another and tried to make sure that there’s common ground and no one is stepping egregiously on anybody’s toes.”
Cole’s district must shed 6,681 voters to conform to the new Census results, while Lucas, whose 3rd District borders Cole’s in many areas, needs to pick up that same amount.
Together, the 5th District and the 1st District, represented by Tulsa Republican Kevin Hern, must shed 69,790 people, which is almost exactly the number that the 2nd District, represented by Westville Republican Markwayne Mullin, must gain.
But, as the maps submitted by the public prove, there are many ways to carve up the state, particularly since much of it is sparsely populated. Cole, Lucas and Mullin all represent vast areas, while Bice and Hern have relatively compact districts.
Andy Moore, the executive director of People Not Politicians, which has called for an independent commission in Oklahoma to draw district lines, said the Legislature should have had the same deadline as the public to submit a map for consideration. The public deadline was Oct. 10.
“At this point, the delay is on them,” Moore said of legislators. “Sure, COVID delayed the Census and data getting out and all that stuff. But they’ve had the data as long as I have, and I’ve drawn dozens of maps and submitted one.”
Moore, who is also executive director of Freedom of Information Oklahoma, said redistricting “is a big deal. It happens only once every 10 years. They could at least give us a few extra days to look at it.”
‘Predominantly Oklahoma City metro’
In a recent interview, Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt said he hadn’t heard Republicans were considering a map that would put downtown into the sprawling 3rd District that encompasses most of western Oklahoma.
But he noted the Oklahoma City metro area is already represented by three members of Congress, a situation he called “fine and unavoidable, as the metro has enough people to fill almost two districts.”
“I do think it is important that there always be at least one congressional district that is predominately comprised of the Oklahoma City metro so that America’s 22nd-largest city always has some level of confidence that one of its metro residents will be in Congress.”
Others, including the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber, have made the same point about having at least one member of Congress whose district is predominantly the Oklahoma City metropolitan area.
There’s a big difference between a district that’s predominantly Oklahoma City or Oklahoma County and a district that’s predominantly the Oklahoma City metro area, which includes several counties.
Though Cole has the Oklahoma City neighborhoods in Cleveland County and Lucas has the ones in Canadian County, Bice, in the 5th District, represents most of Oklahoma City and most of Oklahoma County. Her congressional office is downtown, as was that of Horn, her predecessor.
Moore, with People Not Politicians, submitted a map to the Legislature that puts the 5th District almost entirely in Oklahoma County, aside from a few precincts in north Cleveland County. The map still leaves the precincts around Tinker Air Force Base in the 4th District.
There is strong sentiment in the Oklahoma City and Lawton areas that Tinker and the Army post Fort Sill remain in the same congressional district.
Moore said he acknowledged that sentiment when he drew his map and that his goal was “to draw a map that best reflects where Oklahomans live and how we choose to organize our communities.”
He said, “We just want maps that make sense and that keep communities’ voices together so they have the ability to petition their government and advocate for things in their community in a way that makes sense.”
In the map drawn by Moore, the minority population in the 5th District would be 44%, the most of any of the five districts; the 5th District would be the only politically competitive one in that map.
Dramatic change in the 5th?
A map drawn by Pat McFerron, who is Cole’s pollster and a longtime Republican political consultant in Oklahoma City, would dramatically change the 5th District.
The downtown Oklahoma City area and surrounding neighborhoods would become part of the 3rd District, along with areas down to and including Will Rogers World Airport. The district would lose Seminole County but keep Pottawatomie County and pick up Lincoln County and parts of Canadian and Logan Counties.
In regard to his division of Oklahoma County, McFerron said, “I have long been involved in central Oklahoma issues, and despite municipal boundaries, I would argue that there is a greater community of interest between Edmond and Northwest Oklahoma City with southern Logan and northeast Canadian County than with southern Oklahoma County.
“The areas south of 23rd Street and especially south of the Oklahoma River have very little in common with the Piedmont, Deer Creek, and Edmond School districts, all of which include part of Oklahoma County and an adjacent county.”
The minority population of McFerron’s 5th District would be 34%, the third lowest of the five districts. It would lean heavily Republican, along with the other four districts drawn by McFerron.
Given the reach of the Oklahoma City metro area, the 5th District drawn by McFerron would technically meet the definition of “predominantly comprised of the Oklahoma City metro.”
It just wouldn’t include Bricktown or Scissortail Park or Oklahoma City Community College or the office of the current 5th District representative.
There is some precedent for such a district. Lucas represented many of the same Oklahoma City precincts when he was first elected to Congress in 1994 in the 6th District.
Before Lucas’ election, the 6th district had been gerrymandered to give a Democrat from western Oklahoma the partisan advantage, and he had the Panhandle, downtown Oklahoma City and the neighborhoods east of the state Capitol.
In 2000, Oklahoma lost one of its seats, and one of the Oklahoma members decided to retire. The five districts were then drawn to look essentially like they look today.
Members of both parties predicted that the 5th District would eventually become competitive politically, though Horn’s victory in 2018 was earlier than most anticipated and it gave rise not just to finding a strong opponent but to talk about how the district would be redrawn in 2021.