Today is Census Reapportionment Day, an obscure holiday for nerds with huge implications for everyone else. At 2 p.m. this afternoon, Minnesota will find out if it loses one of its eight seats in Congress. Experts believe Minnesota is likely to lose a seat, but it's not certain — it's possible we keep all eight for another decade. [Read more]
Minnesota will have to redraw its congressional maps in the next year regardless, but losing a seat will mean a much more dramatic reconfiguration of the state's congressional districts will be required.
With control of Minnesota's government divided, it's likely that courts end up drawing Minnesota's maps.
Historical context: Due to divided politics and luck, it's been decades since Minnesota was able to pass new congressional and legislative maps through the "normal" process of a law passing the Legislature and being signed by the governor. In 2011, Republicans controlled the Legislature and Democrats the governorship. 2001 had a GOP House, a DFL Senate and a Reform Party governor. 1991 had a DFL Legislature and a Republican governor. So did 1981. In 1971 Conservatives controlled the officially nonpartisan Legislature while there was a DFL governor. The last time a redistricting plan was passed through the legislative process was 1961 — and that only happened after two vetoes and a special session! [ Read more from Alexis C. Stangl and Matt Gehring of the Minnesota Legislature]
Things could get wild: It'll take months more before Minnesota lawmakers get the full data needed to draw accurate redistricting maps. The combination of that delay, divided legislative control, and the possibility of Minnesota losing a House seat leaves an outside chance for a truly wild outcome: an at-large congressional election in 2022 with all seven representatives being elected statewide. [Read more]
Birk had been discussed as a gubernatorial candidate himself. Now he's out of the race.
Jensen's ability to attract a high-profile endorsement is a modest boost to his candidacy in the so-called "invisible primary" where candidates (and potential candidates) try to line up support from influential party activists.
With four weeks left to the end of Minnesota's legislative session, the two chambers remain a billion dollars apart in setting a new state budget — even before getting to all the little disputes about particular programs in those bills. [Read more from Brian Bakst]
President Joe Biden on Saturday recognized the killings and deportations of hundreds of thousands of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire a century ago as a "genocide," a symbolic critique that Biden's predecessors as president have never been willing to make out of fear of harming the U.S.'s diplomatic relationship with Turkey. [Read more from The Associated Press]
Something completely different: The past week saw huge news just about everywhere except the United States, as a group of the richest clubs in international soccer agreed to form a so-called "Super League" of just a dozen-plus big teams, only for the entire effort to fall apart under withering attacks from fans, existing soccer leagues, and government officials. (One analogy I found helpful: imagine if the Yankees, Red Sox, Cubs, Dodgers, Giants and Mets announced that they wouldn't participate in the MLB playoffs any more, but would instead host their own playoffs in October, in which all six clubs automatically qualified regardless of their record; the best remaining team in the AL and NL would also get an invitation each year.) The idea, driven largely by owners frustrated that their big, popular teams don't get a larger share of soccer's revenues, was conceived in secrecy and flopped almost immediately after being announced. Here's a helpful roundup of events: [ Read more from the New York Times' Tariq Panja and Rory Smith]
Listen: Did you know there are official U.S. Census songs? The 2020 Census held a contest for videos promoting the Census. There were lots of entries; here's the "I Count Song," by Providence Kamana, one of the finalists. [Watch]
