Gerrymandering is one of those words that people miss.
It sounds technical. Far away. Something for political insiders to discuss.
That’s the problem.
Because what people hear when they hear “gerrymandering” is complicated, not for me, and has no impact on my life.
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What it actually means is this:
Someone else may decide how much your vote counts.
We tend to think of elections as a competition of ideas.
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Make your case. Win people over. Earn the outcome.
But that’s not always what happens.
Every ten years, after the census, states redraw the lines that define voting districts. That part makes sense; populations change.
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It’s about who draws the lines.
Because when politicians control the map, they don’t just reflect the voters.
They can shape them.
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Not by changing votes, but by changing how those votes are grouped.
Because what people hear when they hear “gerrymandering” is complicated, not for me, and has no impact on my life.
Divide opposing voters into a few districts so that their influence remains concentrated and limited.
Divide the rest so that they are spread too thin to win anywhere.
The same voters. Same opinions.
Different lines. Different results.
We don’t talk about that enough.
Protesters leave the Capitol during a rally protesting a proposed redistricting map on Tuesday, October 21, 2025 in Raleigh, NC (Chris Seward)
Instead, we debate candidates and policies as if the playing field is level.
It’s not.
The map is part of the strategy.
This is not new.
The term dates back to 1812, when Elbridge Gerry approved a district map in Massachusetts that was so distorted that it looked like it came from a political cartoon. Critics derided it as a “Gerry-mander,” and the name stuck.
Even then, people recognized what was happening.
The lines were not neutral.
They were intentional.
What has changed is how accurate it has become.
Today, mapmakers don’t guess that. They know.
It’s about who draws the lines. Because when politicians control the map, they don’t just reflect the voters.
They have data that can predict behavior down to the neighborhood – sometimes down to the blocks. They can design neighborhoods that look competitive, but aren’t. Neighborhoods that feel fair, but function anything but.
It is no longer gross manipulation.
It’s calibrated.
And this is where the conversation usually ends:
We want this to be someone else’s problem.
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Opponents of California Proposition 50, also known as the Election Rigging Response Act, a California ballot measure that would redraw the congressional maps in favor of Democrats, rally in Westminster, California, on Wednesday, September 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, file)
It’s not.
Even the people we trust to lead us tell the system. Former President Barack Obama warned in 2016: “We must end the practice of drawing our congressional districts so that politicians can choose their voters, not the other way around.”
The Republicans are firing back just as vigorously. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis criticized gerrymandering in Virginia: “Look at the map of Virginia. How grotesque it is.”
Different parties. Different goals.
The same underlying truth.
This is what a power problem looks like.
When one party uses it, the other party justifies it.
When both parties use it, it becomes normalized.
And once it’s normalized, we stop questioning it.
But we should.
Because this not only determines outcomes, but also reshapes power.
It takes power away from voters and concentrates it in the hands of the people who draw the lines.
What has changed is how accurate it has become. Today, mapmakers don’t guess that. They know.
And when power concentrates, representation weakens.
Not every vote carries the same weight.
Not every community is heard in the same way.
Not every voice translates into influence equally.
And we can see the impact.
Take 2012 in Wisconsin, for example, when Democrats won two statewide elections and had a clear majority of the population, yet could only secure 39 of the 99 seats in the Assembly. Or 2018, when Democratic candidates for the State Assembly won 52% of the total votes cast, but captured only 35% of the seats.
Signs urge early voters to vote yes or no on the Virginia redistricting referendum at the Ellen M. Bozman Government Center in Arlington, Virginia, on Tuesday, March 31, 2026. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
The same voters. Same election.
Different map – different reality.
When districts are designed to be safe, elections become less competitive.
When elections are less competitive, fewer votes matter.
When fewer voices matter, people withdraw, or choose their side because that’s the only place they feel heard.
That’s not just politics.
This is how trust erodes.
In an interview on “60 Minutes,” former Republican Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska warned of the dangers of tribalism and discussed how we are losing the ability to talk across differences.
Gerrymandering doesn’t just coexist with that trend.
It feeds it.
Because if you don’t have to win over a broad group of people, you don’t have to listen to them.
If you don’t have to listen, you don’t have to convince.
And if you don’t have to convince, you don’t need common ground.
When districts are designed to be safe, elections become less competitive.
When elections are less competitive, fewer votes matter.
There is an uncomfortable paradox here.
This process can help your side win.
And it still costs you your vote.
Because a system designed to protect results eventually no longer requires input.
Not all at once. Not in a headline-making way.
But slowly… until participation feels less meaningful and representation feels more distant.
We have talked about elections as if the battle is about ideas.
Protesters outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, Oct. 15, 2025. U.S. Supreme Court conservatives suggested they would limit the creation of majority-Black and majority-Hispanic electoral districts in a case that could further undermine a landmark civil rights law and boost Republican electoral prospects. (Eric Lee/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
It is increasingly also about structure.
About who is being counted.
About how those votes are converted into power.
So the real question is not partisan.
It’s fundamental.
Do voters choose their representatives?
Or do representatives choose their voters?
Gerrymandering sounds like a technical problem.
It’s not.
It’s a signal.
And what it signals is this:
The system is not as neutral as we want to believe.
We can continue to treat it as background noise.
Or we can recognize what it actually is: a silent shift in who is heard – and who is not.
Because a system designed to protect results eventually no longer requires input. Not all at once. Not in a headline-making way. But slowly… until participation feels less meaningful and representation feels more distant.
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And once you see it that way, it’s hard not to see it again.
We’ve been arguing for years about who wins.
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We’ve spent a lot less time wondering who made the rules for winning in the first place.
And once you realize that the rules can be formed before a single vote is cast, it changes the way you see everything that comes after.
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