Proposed NYC congressional map would shift S.I. district into more liberal parts of Brooklyn – SILive.com

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. New Yorks Democrat-controlled Legislature released the first look Sunday night at what the states proposed congressional district lines could look like for the next 10 years.

Staten Islands district, which it shares with part of Brooklyn, would shift from more conservative areas, like Dyker Heights and Bath Beach, to more liberal areas like Park Slope and Sunset Park, according to the map from the New York Legislative State Task Force on Demographic Research and Apportionment.

The district covering Staten Island, New Yorks 11th Congressional, has been one of the nations most closely watched. Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-Staten Island/South Brooklyn) took over the seat last year after defeating former Rep. Max Rose in 2020 with 53.1% of the vote.

For most of the last decade, the seat was reliably Republican, but in 2018, Rose defeated former Republican Rep. Dan Donovan.

Rose, who grew up in Park Slope, has declared his candidacy for the 2022 election, and is expected to face off against fellow Democrats, Brittany Ramos-DeBarros and Dr. Komi Agoda-Koussema, in the June primary.

Map shows what New York's 11th Congressional District has look like since 2012. (Courtesy: LATFOR)

At the national level, the new statewide map could lead to Democratic gains in New Yorks House of Representatives delegation that would help offset their expected losses in states like Texas and Florida.

Locally and at the state level, Republican Party officials fired back at the map proposal calling it an effort to silence conservative voices in whats become an overwhelmingly Democratic state.

Anthony Reinhart, chairman of the Staten Island Republican Party, likened the map to cancel culture, due to Staten Island conservatives continuous lack of conformity with their liberal counterparts around the city.

We see this for precisely what it is - an attempt by those who brought us rising crime and high taxes to subvert the voices of Staten Islanders by tying our borough to [former Mayor Bill de Blasios] Park Slope. he said.

Clearly political shenanigans are at play to silence our voices. We will not be silenced. We will not be canceled. We will come out stronger than ever to re-elect Congresswoman Malliotakis.

New York Republican Party Chairman Nick Langworthy said the party is reviewing possible legal challenges to what he described as an effort to gerrymander the state. Gerrymandering is a political strategy in which district lines are drawn to benefit a particular group.

These maps are the most brazen and outrageous attempt at rigging the election to keep Nancy Pelosi as speaker, he said.

Voters spoke loud and clear in rejecting their partisan power grab last year and in 2014, but Democrats are circumventing the will of the people. They cant win on the merits so theyre trying to win the election in a smoke-filled room rather than the ballot box.

A representative for the Staten Island Democratic Party did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication, and the state party has yet to issue a statement on the proposed lines that could be voted on as soon as this week.

State Senator Michael Gianaris (D-Queens), who chairs the legislative redistricting task force, told the New York Times that they did the best they could with a flawed system.

This is a very Democratic state, lets start there. Its not surprising that a fairly drawn map might lead to more Democrats getting elected, he said.

The task force will also redraw district lines for the State Assembly and Senate, but has yet to release those proposals on its website. City Council districts are drawn during a separate local process.

In 2014, New Yorkers passed a ballot proposal that created the New York Independent Redistricting Commission (NYIRC) in an effort to limit the politics involved with the process that takes place after every decennial U.S. Census.

However, the 10-member commission broke down on partisan lines, and failed to find a compromise on how district lines should be drawn. The group never even submitted a unified set of maps after a series of public testimony hearings around the state.

The process shifted to the Legislature earlier this month after lawmakers chose not to adopt any of the NYIRC-proposed maps, and for the first time in decades a single party, Democrats, have complete control over both of New Yorks legislative chambers and its governors mansion.

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Proposed NYC congressional map would shift S.I. district into more liberal parts of Brooklyn - SILive.com