With a loss of over 100,000 residents in the last 9 years, and a steady population decrease over the last 5 years, 2020's census will probably cost us a seat.

Election Data Services recently released its annual projections of which states will gain and lose U.S. Representatives at the next turn of the decade. The projections show Illinois’ 18th Representative will almost certainly be removed and given to another state.

Other states projected to lose seats include Alabama, California, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Rhode Island, and West Virginia, according to EDS. New York is projected to lose two representatives.

Arizona, Colorado, Montana, North Carolina and Oregon are all on track to gain a member of the House. Seeing even larger population booms, Florida will likely gain two new representatives and Texas should gain three.

The seats will be realigned in 2021. With Democrats in control of both houses of the General Assembly and J.B. Pritzker set to take office next week, the party will have control over redrawing congressional boundaries for the state over the next 10 years.

Kimball Brace, Election Data Services:

What we are still not certain of is if that loss will actually be two seats and [Illinois] is very close to that,” he said.

Nationally, Brace said most states are seeing fewer people move out of state than normal, where Illinois saw more than 114,000 people move away last year.

“Movement between states is down to only 10 percent,” he said.

The seats will be realigned in 2021. When the Democrats in control of the state redrew the maps in 2001, a Republican Congressional seat was lost.

The official reapportionment will happen in 2021 after Census numbers are finalized. Once the redraw is certified between the Democratically-controlled General Assembly and Gov. J.B. Pritzker, the 2022 election will reflect the newly-drawn maps with fewer representatives.

 

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