Among the several factors that may change the political map, in Tennessee as elsewhere, are the numbers from the 2020 census. As a result of them, the dimensions of numerous governmental districts are due to change — with effects highly noticeable in Shelby County and West Tennessee.
Both the 9th Congressional District, which includes most of Memphis and is currently represented by Democrat Steve Cohen, and the 8th Congressional District, which contains a key sliver of East Memphis and is represented by Republican David Kustoff, will have to expand their boundaries to approximate the average district population in Tennessee, which the Census Bureau found to be 767,871.
Inasmuch as the 2020 population of the 9th District was certified as 690,749, and that of the 8th District as 716,347, both West Tennessee districts will need to stretch their limits. The 9th District actually lost 14,376 people from its 2010 population of 705,125, a diminishment of 2 percent. The 8th, by contrast, grew by 11,227 people from 705,120, a gain of 1.6 percent. But, since both districts fell below the stage growth average of 8.49 percent, their boundaries will expand.
New configurations will occur elsewhere in the state, as well — particularly in Middle Tennessee, where several districts that experienced population booms in the last decade will have to shrink. The state’s population as a whole is now reckoned at 6.91 million, representing an increase of something like 564,000 people in a decade. But Tennessee’s growth pattern still lagged behind the national average, so Tennessee will continue with its current lineup of nine congressional seats with no additional seats added.
Again, both the 8th and 9th Districts in Tennessee will have to grow geographically to catch up with the state average of population per district. That will undoubtedly cause some tension and horse-trading as state lawmakers, who must make the determination of new district lines for congressional and state offices, set to the task, which has a deadline of April 7, 2022. (In the case of local government districts, for commission, council, and school districts, the deadline is January 1, 2022.)
The situation recalls a previous significant change in the boundaries of Districts 8 and 9 that occurred in 2011 after the 2010 census. That reapportionment process was the first overseen by a Republican legislative majority, and it resulted in the surrender of a prize hunk of donor-rich East Memphis turf from Cohen’s 9th District to the 8th. Cohen was compensated by territory to the north of Shelby County in Millington.
Given the fact of continued GOP dominance of the General Assembly, the valuable East Memphis salient is liable to stay in Kustoff’s 8th District. The 9th will have to expand somewhere else in the 8th District, which surrounds it — a fact that creates a whack-a-mole situation for Kustoff, who’ll have to compensate, possibly from the adjoining 7th District.
Meanwhile, several legislative districts in Shelby County are seriously under-strength in relation to average statewide population figures. These include state Senate districts 29, 30, and 33 — now held by Democrats Raumesh Akbari, Sara Kyle, and Katrina Robinson, respectively — and state House Districts 86, 90, 91, and 93 — represented currently by Democrats Barbara Cooper, Torrey Harris, London Lamar, and G.A. Hardaway, respectively.
Significant changes are likely to occur also in legislative reapportionment, possibly in the loss of a seat or two in Shelby County.
