Monday’s trial recaps are here and here. Tuesday’s trial recaps are here and here. Wednesday’s trial recaps are here and here.
The trial took a four day break and returns a little lighter on the plaintiff side. Some of the specialized lawyers from around the county returned home after Wednesday’s scheduled end, leaving the wrap up to a smaller group.
Monday, April 11, 9AM
We start with the declaration statement of a plaintiff witness (a Lawrence voter named in the lawsuit). He had a chemo treatment last Wednesday and was also unavailable today. After some objections to the content, the defense eventually agrees to the statement with the exclusion of one sentence about the witness’ fear of his vote not counting in CD-1.
The last witness for the defense is Dr. John Alford of Rice University. He has degrees from Houston and a Masters and Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Iowa. Additionally, he has been an expert witness in several redistricting cases, mostly involving Texas, but also appearing in LA, FL, AR, SC, AL, GA, MI, WI, and a few others. In 2010, he worked on a lawsuit with the Texas AG defending maps. He has also advised the Texas Redistricting board in the past on state maps and is very familiar with the Voting Rights Act because he advised states that required pre-clearance approval of maps prior to the recent US Supreme Court decision eliminating it. He boasts his expert status is partially based on his work in Texas, which is in the states “hall of fame” when it comes to gerrymandering.
It’s obvious the defense spent the weekend actually prepping this witness and working on presenting a consistent message. He has not published academically on redistricting, but that is by choice. He doesn’t feel it appropriate to submit impartial research papers on a topic where he also is an active consultant advocating specific positions for clients.
He studied the Ad Astra map and concluded there is insufficient evidence of racial gerrymandering, racially polarized voting or voter dilution. There is some evidence of partisan gerrymandering, but it’s consistent and typical compared with other state legislature products. Ad Astra is in a normal range when compared to a state like Maryland, which is a worse partisan gerrymander.
There are signs that could signal a classic gerrymander that aren’t present here. No representative was drawn out of their district. CD-3 appears competitive and even likely to produce a Democratic win. Objection — Predicting a win is not in his report and he is speculating about elections results without proper foundation. Sustain, the witness will leave predictions out. Dr. Alford is asked about applying previous election results to Ad Astra to prove its competitiveness. He is asked about EG and if he thinks plaintiff experts properly used it in their Kansas analysis knowing the inaccuracy problems with small states. There are some objections to the scope of his testimony going beyond his submitted report, but is generally allowed to comment. He has concerns about its use here.
As to changes in the racial demographics, he notes there are some minor changes in the new CD numbers, but not enough to significantly influence outcomes, especially since the composition of individual minority groups (breaking out Black, Latino, Asian, Native American) is so small and evenly divided that no one group could prove dilution. Everything moves by just a few points or less.
Cross begins at 10:55 with questions about his active involvement in Texas redistricting when the courts ruled Texas violated laws regarding racially gerrymandering. Q — You were and are a consultant to a state you called a member of the state gerrymandering “hall of fame”. A — Yes, but I don’t draw the maps. I advise.
Q — You have not written or taught specifically about EG? A — No.
Q — You didn’t analyze the Kansas guidelines or the Legislative record that produced this map? A — No. Q — You didn’t try to replicate the results of the models used by experts here? A — No, I didn’t have time to do that. Q — Is EG and EI the best tools we have to perform analysis on the nature of gerrymandered maps? A — Yes. Q — You don’t dispute the numbers from Dr. Chen’s simulations or Dr. Miller’s population numbers regarding CD-1 and Lawrence? A — No.
Q — CD-2 is the most diverse CD in Ad Astra? A — Yes. Q — The analysis shows the minority preferred candidate in CD-2 would lose in this most diverse district 99% of the time? A — Yes.
Q — You agree that narrow tracts of land connecting large areas is a classic gerrymandering red flag? A — It can be, but it depends. There can be other influences for the shape.
Dr. Alford faired much better than Wednesday’s witnesses. He stuck to his message and conceded as little as possible. Plaintiffs upheld their experts positions despite witness criticism.
The defense rests.
Plaintiffs call Dr. Jowei Chen for redirect.
Last week we looked at breakdowns for your 1,000 maps and heard about numbers when Wyandotte County was split compared to Ad Astra. You looked again specifically for maps generated that kept Johnson County whole. That has been offered as a driving factor by the defense in the process. What did you find?
Out of 1,000 random maps generated using basic required criteria (even population distribution, contiguous districts / counties, only splitting 3 counties to create 4 CDs), 514 maps kept Johnson County whole. Comparing Ad Astra to just this subset of maps, all keeping Johnson County whole, Ad Astra is still an extreme partisan outlier, just as in comparison to the full suite of maps. In the 514 maps, Democrats would be expected to have an advantage in CD-3, from a lean to safe rating in nearly all of them. Ad Astra has a GOP advantage of 50.5% which puts it at the far end of the results.
Q — This would rate Ad Astra as a 4-0 GOP map. A — Yes.
Q — In the subset of 514 Johnson County whole maps, how many maps are 3-1 GOP and how many are 4-0 GOP maps. A — 98.8% are 3-1 maps and 1.17% are 4-0 maps.
What about CD-1 in this subset? A — We have the same extreme outlier pattern, it’s just reversed. The GOP advantage in CD-1 is always above 70%. 70% is the lowest GOP advantage in the random maps set. Ad Astra puts the GOP advantage at only 65%. That is an over 99.8% outlier. Q — That because of the inclusion of Lawrence? A — Exactly. Q — Are the 1,000 maps in the simulation “packing” GOP voters into CD-1? A — No. It is random; but western Kansas is western Kansas. It is always the main feature of CD-1. It will always be the most conservative district due to the strength of the GOP in this half of the state. The random maps end up consistently with approximately 75% GOP advantage. That would be the norm, and not a “packed” result. Again, Ad Astra is the underperforming outlier at 65% GOP advantage.
On cross — the defense again tries to ask about other results, predictions, and reports multiple times, to the objections of plaintiff. The judge agrees, these questions are way out of the scope of his report and redirect.
There is confusion from the defense about the outlier red dot on the graphs representing Ad Astra. Q — If you use just 2018 election data, wouldn’t that red dot shift toward the group of 1,000 maps making it less of an outlier? A — NO! If you are using different election data, that would be plugged into all the maps. If the red dot of Ad Astra shifts, all the other dots would also shift. The outlier nature doesn’t change.
Now we are done with testimony. Before lunch, we have yet another renewed defense motion to dismiss. Thankfully, we don’t hear the arguments yet again. Both sides stand on previous statements. The judge also stands on his previous ruling. No dismissal.
12:20, Lunch? Plaintiffs ask to skip. Total closings will only take about an hour total. The judge is not convinced. Why do we want to skip? Well, we have some out of town attorneys that we promised to treat to authentic Kansas City barbeque before heading to the airport.
OK, we’ll compromise. Grab some celery sticks and be back in 45 minutes.
Closing arguments and thoughts in the next post.