During summer 2025, Gerrymandering felt like it was at the center of the universe; at least it did to me, an intern in D.C. for my congressman who had just been offered a job to stay on as his campaign director. It all started when Texas proposed legislation to redraw its congressional districts for the 2026 elections (actually it didn’t start there, there has been a long history of Gerrymandering dating back to 1812 when the governor of Massachusetts needed more votes, but for the sake of this story we’re sticking with Texas). As a reaction to Texas lawmakers’ proposals, many Democratic majority states proposed their own gerrymandered maps to counteract the Republicans gains that would be made in Texas. This is where I come in. I’m from Illinois, which is already widely agreed to be among the most gerrymandered states, second only to maybe Maryland.
The day after I started my job as Campaign Director, a map proposal was leaked. It showed Illinois Republicans losing all but one seat in Congress. It also showed GOP members’ homes intentionally drawn outside of their districts and into newly created blue districts, so that if they were to try to keep their seat they would have to run from outside of the district they wanted to represent. A wave of emotions rushed over me; first was anger, politicians that I was already against were now playing games with whether or not I got to elect meaningful representation. But then came fear; was my new job in danger? Was my home, my way of life in Southern Illinois in jeopardy? Would living in my hometown still be possible for someone like me who has political ambition, or would I have to find someplace else to flee to?
You’ll never find someone more opposed to gerrymandering than a Southern Illinoisan.
You’ll never find someone more opposed to gerrymandering than a Southern Illinoisan. We’ve already dealt with it once in recent memory. In 2022, Illinois redistricting saw my congressional district nearly double in geographic size. Mike Bost, my Congressman and boss, lost a huge chunk of his constituency and gained new voters as far away as Clark county which borders Indiana; his home county of Jackson borders Missouri. This sudden shake-up wasn’t easy. Mike had to open a new Congressional office to accommodate people, and even today, four years later, when I go to campaign events in the Northeast parts of our district, it is far more common for me to interact with voters who don’t know who their Congressman is. This displacement is part of why gerrymandering is wrongheaded. So now imagine the ire of Southern Illinoisans whenever Governor J.B. Pritzker stated in November that Illinois gerrymandering would depend on redistricting in red states. If they did it, we were going to as well. Gerrymandering affects real, everyday people. It’s wrong when anybody does it.
My work on the campaign trail has also revealed to me a much less commonly talked about problem with gerrymandering, the infighting it causes. Party infighting is commonplace in any political system, that’s what primaries are all about; lots of different people vie for control of the direction a party is headed. However, in a gerrymandered district, this happens more than is natural in fairly drawn states. Gerrymandering forces the politically ambitious within the minority party of a state to tear one another down in order to gain any power at all. This is true for both U.S. Congress seats as well as State Representative and State Senate offices. There are tons of examples of this happening in Southern Illinois. Incumbents within your own party become your opponent because they have to be if you want to get ahead. On the campaign trail, I have often seen incumbents get attacked by being called RINOS (Republicans In Name Only) from the right side of their own party. The complaints of in-party opposition are rarely substantive and often petty, but they come about frequently because its an outsiders only hope in displacing an incumbent. It isn’t the incumbent’s fault that the number of seats are limited, but the situation forces them to become the enemy. It’s like an old western feud: one cowboy says to the other, “This district ain’t big enough for the both of us.” Showdown is at high noon. Unfortunately, nobody is walking away from that duel unscathed. Instead, this infighting helps the majority within a gerrymandered state as the minority tears itself apart. A majority party shrinks its opposition through gerrymandering and then watches its opposition rip itself apart in order to cling onto what little remaining power there is; it’s a continuous feedback loop.
It’s like an old western feud, one cowboy says to the other, “This district ain’t big enough for the both of us.” Showdown is at high noon.
Gerrymandering is wrong for a myriad of reasons, it displaces people, it takes away their right to vote, it tears down fair opposition. The unfortunate truth is that it is really helpful for the majority party, and for that reason will never stop once it has started. Not only does it shrink a minority party’s presence, but it also causes in-fighting within that weakens them farther. Thats a downer note to end on, but its honest. People who fall victim to gerrymandering deserve to be liberated from it. With that, all I have to say is… Statehood for Southern Illinois!
Jace Slone ‘27 studies in the College of Arts & Sciences. He can be reached at j.d.slone@wustl.edu.