A group of state leaders and advocacy groups said Tuesday that efforts to redraw Missouri’s congressional districts will lump together urban and rural areas, potentially pitting communities against each other as they try to get their priorities in front of elected officials.
Representatives of the NAACP, the Missouri Voter Protection Coalition, the Missouri Workers Center and others said during a virtual news conference that a proposed map designed to split the 5th Congressional District, which encompasses Kansas City, would weaken voter representation and harm communities.
Missouri currently has eight congressional districts. Under the 6-2 map, the two districts that cover Kansas City and St. Louis are held by Democrats. But during a special legislative session that begins on Wednesday, Missouri Republicans hope to split Kansas City and dilute 5th District voters into the surrounding 4th and 6th districts, creating a 7-1 Republican-leaning map and eliminating U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver's safe Democratic seat.
Denise Lieberman, director and general counsel of the Missouri Voter Protection Coalition, said the proposed map would create a congressional district that combines parts of the Kansas City metro with farmers who live more than 250 miles away, including along the Iowa and Illinois borders. That would make it harder for communities to be fairly represented in Congress, she said.
“Redrawing congressional district lines mid-decade without any new census data … takes away voters’ power to elect candidates of their choice, which causes real harm to our communities,” she said. “That whole notion of ‘one person, one vote’ is about ensuring that everybody’s vote counts.”
Angela Johnston is a multigenerational family farmer who lives in Memphis, Missouri, a town of about 1,700 people approximately 10 to 15 miles from the border with Iowa. She said agriculture is one of the top industries in the northeast part of the state, and she’s concerned that someone who represents her community in Congress isn’t necessarily the same person who would represent an urban area.
“Lumping us in with large cities, we have two different agendas. We all need different things from our politicians,” she said. “Those in the city and those of us who live in rural Missouri, it’s just very different.”
Rod Chapel, president of the Missouri State Conference of the NAACP, said a map that combines too many different communities across the state will dilute voters’ voices.
“The communities of interest are not the same, the populations are not the same,” he said. "The disparities and the opportunities are not the same — some agrarian, some urban."
Terrence Wise, a 5th District resident and a leader with the Missouri Workers Center, called on Missouri lawmakers to reject the gerrymandered map.
“That seat is not Emanuel Cleaver’s seat,” Wise said. “That’s my seat, my voice and my community’s voice that’s being snatched away.”
Hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of residents protested in Kansas City on Monday, displaying placards and signs reading “Save Democracy,” “End Gerrymandering,” and “Hands Off Our Districts.” The gathering mirrored large protests nationwide designed to object to the perceived disenfranchisement of Democrats by Republican efforts to redraw the lines around blue districts.
Republicans have said a 7-1 map better aligns with Missouri’s politics.
“We are a Republican state. Republicans have supermajorities in the Missouri House and the Missouri Senate,” U.S. Rep. Bob Onder, of the 3rd Congressional District, said in an interview with St. Louis Public Radio. “Republicans hold all of our statewide elected offices, including, of course, governor. And I believe that we should pass a congressional map that reflects the values of the state of Missouri.”
Missouri has jumped into a nationwide fight over redistricting that has been pushed by President Donald Trump, who’s looking to gain Republican seats in Congress. Texas lawmakers have already approved a new map for their state that could add up to five Republican seats, while the California governor has threatened to draw up a map for his own state that would add an equal number of Democratic seats.
