Proposition 50, or the Election Rigging Response Act, is one of two items on the ballot for Nevada County voters in the 2025 legislative election. According to the official voter guide of California, the proposition would “[require] temporary use of new congressional district maps through 2030.”
What is Redistricting?
For those unfamiliar with statewide redistricting, a redistricting map must be drawn every decade in each state after the national census is completed to ensure that each district is accurately represented within Congress. In Congress, the House of Representatives has a current seat amount of 435 voting members, and each year the census must be retaken and districts must be redrawn so that each of those members represent around the same amount of people. This will mean that more populous states, such as California, get more representatives in the House while less populous states, such as Wyoming, will get marginally less. The United States Census Bureau has an article on how Congressional Districts work.
Currently, 2025 falls in the middle of the decade of the last census, conducted in 2020. Every 10 years a count of the U.S. population is required by the Constitution to ensure that the districts are accurately represented in Congress. Therefore, the official national census and mandatory district amendments will be completed in 2030. This is why Prop 50 will only be valid until that date, unless it is kept as the official decade long census district map under the official census.
Democrats and Republicans continue the struggle for the House on the national level, according to UC Berkeley News, “There certainly is talk about it in Illinois, there’s talk about it in Maryland, talk about it in New York.” However, talk about redistricting in states other than California to favor Democrats is seeming to not be acted on as the November 4 deadline gets closer.
How will “Yes” on 50 Affect Truckee?
Truckee would be one of the many towns in the crosshairs of mid-census redistricting. A “yes” on Prop 50 would mean that Truckee’s place as a part of the third district of California would remain, but many other towns on the southern part of the Sierra Nevadas would be pushed to either districts one or five instead.
One thing that is being projected to change in California’s third district is a flip to a Democratic representative in the House. Because of how the lines are drawn, inclusion of eastern parts of Sacramento would likely shift towards a Democratic candidate, along with Nevada County’s voters, which include 29,856 registered Democratic voters in 2023, according to the Nevada County website.
Our current representative is Republican Kevin Kiley, and the probable Democratic district would be unlikely to reelect him. He may continue to run for the fifth district of California, the district that includes the lower part of the Eastern Sierra Nevadas, which he has represented most of under the current third district.
A point over the map change for Prop 50 for the more rural parts of Truckee and surrounding towns is that the votes from Truckee will be combined with the larger populations of towns like Folsom and Rancho Cordova down near Sacramento. The California State Assembly has released an interactive map of the proposed districts. Because of the suburban nature of the communities near Sacramento, it is possible that certain district votes will not reflect the rural and mountainous aspects of Truckee.
How will a “yes” affect High School Students?
The passing of Prop 50 would likely have few immediate effects on the current teens of the greater Truckee region. As with everywhere, local effects of national politics take time to trickle down unless it is a piece of legislation that will directly affect the region. The time it takes for national policies to affect a local scale will likely result in local teens seeing the effects of the federal government in the following months or even years to come.
In a larger picture, there may be slight changes seen in the next four years before the 2030 National Census in certain areas often pursued by the Democratic party. If Prop 50 were to pass and a Democrat be elected as a representative to the third district, there may be increases to educational funding for those in high school late in the next four years, as that is stereotypically part of the Democratic party platform.
There may also be impacts to public health care or even environmental movements. However, this largely depends on the party or the individuals in control of the national government at the time. If Republicans remain in control of Congress and the Executive Branch, it is unlikely that Democratic legislation will pass, and if Democrats take either the House or Senate in the next four years, it is unlikely that Republican legislature will pass through the federal government.
