Letters to the Editor: Republicans have only themselves to blame for California’s gerrymandering

To the editor: This situation is entirely on President Trump and all his enablers (“Millions of Californians have been cast adrift. For nothing,” Nov. 11). You live by the gerrymandering, you get an electoral drubbing by the gerrymandering. If that means we have gerrymandering in California through the 2030 election, that’s the price for the GOP breaking the rules.

It does no good to observe that the gerrymanders weren’t really necessary for the 2026 midterms. As columnist Mark Z. Barabak acknowledges, we only found that out after the results came in. In 2025, it was far from obvious. Responding with blue gerrymanders, here and in other states, was a necessary reaction.

To his point that approximately 25% of the state’s voters have their “representation” reduced down to 8%, here’s what I say to that: Maybe you shouldn’t support a party that doesn’t support democracy or the rule of law. Maybe you shouldn’t support a party that, until last year, was way out ahead on gerrymandering. And a party that is solely behind voter suppression.

Maybe a party like that needs to be reduced to 8% of the state’s caucus to reform itself. It’s not that every Republican in California supports that authoritarian streak in the modern GOP; it’s that it hasn’t been a dealbreaker for them, unlike most of us.

Democrats want to get rid of gerrymandering. They’ve only been doing it to fight fire with fire. But Republicans have refused to support, and have blocked, legislation at the federal level that would stop it. So they don’t get to complain when it works against them.

Paul Giorgi, Glendale

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To the editor: Barabak is now effectively saying that I, a supporter of Proposition 50, should be condemned for depriving millions of California Republicans of representation in Congress. That I ought to have ignored the obvious attempts by the Trump administration to interfere in the 2026 election.

Was Barabak not aware of the dread that many of us felt at our concern for the very future of our democracy?

Anyone with any knowledge of the politics of the last election was grimly aware that California was already depriving a significant portion of its residents.

Larry Harmell, Los Angeles

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To the editor: Barabak skims the surface while highlighting the number of California Republicans who have been gerrymandered out of representation. They actually have representation; they just do not like their minority-party status to be worsened. The plight of all voters needs to be addressed in five ways:

1. Replace gerrymandered districts with public commission-designed districts.
2. Require electoral college delegates to be apportioned in accordance with the popular vote cast for national offices.
3. Install ranked-choice voting so voters’ range of preferences can be registered.
4. Define personhood as a living, breathing human, and limit campaign donations to defined persons who are registered to vote, not corporations.
5. Restructure the Supreme Court to add more jurists with term limits, and limit the number of judges any one administration can appoint to the court. In so doing, the court’s hamstringing decisions about elections might be reversed over time.
   

Todd Collart, Ventura

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To the editor: There’s nothing like 20/20 hindsight or Monday morning quarterbacking. Last year, no one could have predicted (with certainty) the “bluenami.”

Most of us would agree with Barabak’s contention that gerrymandering is very bad, but I take exception to his statement that when Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed the counter-gerrymandering, “The battle was joined.”

In reality, the battle was joined when Trump gave orders to Texas. It would have been insane to do nothing.

As to California’s districts in 2030, the law is clear: We go back to fair, nonpartisan districting.

Barabak makes a strong case for proportional representation, but under a system of districts, there’s nothing that says a party with 25% support should get 25% of the seats.

William L. Rukeyser, Davis