Illinois and West Virginia will both lose a seat in their congressional delegations next year, and the shrinking maps will set the stage for House member vs. member primaries in both states.
Following the 2020 census, states are redrawing their congressional and state legislative district boundaries to reflect their new population counts and, in some cases, the new number of representatives. Population loss found in both Illinois and West Virginia will cost each state a House seat.
State lawmakers in each state redrew congressional maps in a way that will prompt members of Congress to run against their colleagues in a redrawn district.
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In West Virginia, a three-member delegation will shrink to two. A proposed map would place Republican Reps. David McKinley and Alex Mooney in the same district in the northern part of the state, leaving Rep. Carol Miller in a safe district in the south. Both McKinley and Mooney have announced they plan to run for the new district.
GOPAC, a group that works to elect Republican candidates, recently released a poll showing McKinley leading Mooney 44% to 29% among likely Republican primary voters, with 18% undecided. GOPAC has donated to McKinley.
David Avella, chairman of GOPAC, told the Washington Examiner that the new district includes most of McKinley’s existing district, giving him an advantage in name recognition and familiarity with voters.
Avella said his advice to the candidates would be to “spend time in the parts of the district you’re not known in.”
“Republican primary voters in this new district are looking for somebody who can deliver on jobs, taxes, and inflation,” Avella said.
While noting that “nothing is a guarantee” in today’s political climate, the seat is likely to remain in Republican control. He added that the poll found that 33% of likely Republican primary voters support reelection for West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, a centrist Democrat.
“Sen. Manchin has been able to craft a brand unique to his own in West Virginia,” Avella said, and his support from some Republicans shows how much “work Republicans have to do to unseat him in 2024.”
In Illinois, the state Legislature passed a new congressional map that will likely allow Democrats to control 14 of the state’s 17 congressional districts. The map set the stage for multiple matchups between incumbents and prompted the announcement of GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger’s retirement after he declined to run in a primary against fellow incumbent Rep. Darin LaHood or a Trump-backed challenger.
The map would also pit Republican Reps. Mike Bost and Mary Miller against each other. Bost has signaled his intentions to run, but Miller’s intentions were not immediately clear.
But the Illinois map, while shrinking the number of likely Republican seats, doesn’t protect every Democratic incumbent, likely leaving liberal freshman Rep. Marie Newman in an unsafe seat.
Newman in 2020 narrowly defeated former Rep. Dan Lipinski, one of the last anti-abortion Democrats in Congress, in a primary last year, and she was later elected to Congress.
The Illinois map placed Newman in the same district as Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, both vice chairs of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. But Newman announced she would instead challenge Rep. Sean Casten. Congressional candidates in Illinois are not required to live in the district they seek to represent, and Newman’s home is just four blocks away from the new district’s line, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.
In a statement, Newman said, “The lion’s share of this new district is made up of the communities and residents I represent today, and I look forward to continuing to serve them in Congress.”
Casten, in his own statement, said he “never wanted to see friends run against friends.”
Lipinski, meanwhile, has indicated he might run for Congress again.
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Earlier this month, Texas lawmakers, who will add two seats to their congressional delegation next year, were set to approve a map that would have pitted Reps. Sheila Jackson Lee and Al Green against each other in a primary, but they reversed course and left the incumbents in separate districts.
