California's 23rd congressional district
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California's 23rd congressional district covers parts of Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties. It is one of 53 California Congressional Districts.
The current Representative for this district is Lois Capps, a Democrat.
The district is moderately to heavily (in some places) Democratic with Capps winning the last election (2006) with 65% of the vote. George W. Bush received 40% of the vote in this district in 2004. The district has a Cook Partisan Voting Index score of D +9.
Proportionally, it is one of the narrowest districts in the United States and is barely noticeable on most maps. The lines of this district are controversial and are a result of California's bi-partisan incumbent gerrymandering. The district lines are used both as an outrageous example of Gerrymandering (since the district favors a Democrat and is over 200 miles long) and contrarilly as an outstanding example of the preservation of the common interests of voters. If the district was distributed among the adjacent inland districts there would be less effective representation of coastal interests, particularly with regards to fisheries, tourism, development, and offshore oil drilling.
However, to preserve Republican numbers representing California in the House of Representatives, the state Republican party has fought to avoid having any part of this district combined with the less-populous parts of either Ventura or Santa Barbara counties, as this would erode Republican majorities.
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| California's congressional districts |
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| 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 See also: California's past & present Representatives, Senators, and Delegations All U.S. districts - Apportionment - Redistricting - Gerrymandering - Maps |
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