Wisconsin Public Radio: New Federal Trial Eyes Wisconsin's Legislative Map
"Wisconsin is the most extreme partisan gerrymander in the United States in the post-2010 cycle," said attorney Gerry Hebert, who's the executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based Campaign Legal Center. "It's about as far out from what you would consider to be fair as you can imagine."
"I think we have found the way in this case to really cleanse a big stain on our democracy that has existed for a long time, but has gotten really exacerbated in the last couple of decades where partisan gerrymandering has become the political weapon of choice in the political warfare," Hebert said.
Essentially, the coalition challenging Wisconsin's map came up with a new metric to measure partisanship called the "efficiency gap." Attorney Ruth Greenwood, a redistricting specialist for the Campaign Legal Center, said it compares raw vote totals to actual wins.
"If you look at the total number of votes between the parties, they're relatively similar. Wisconsin’s a competitive state," Greenwood said.