Minnesota enacted new congressional district boundaries on Feb. 15 when a special judicial redistricting panel issued an order adopting final maps. Minnesota was apportioned eight seats in the U.S. House of Representatives after the 2020 census, the same number it received after the 2010 census. This map will take effect for Minnesota’s 2022 congressional elections.
In its unanimous order, the panel wrote, “To afford counties and municipalities time to complete local redistricting, the statutory deadline for completing congressional and legislative redistricting is ’25 weeks before the state primary election in the year ending in two.’ In this decennium, that date is Feb. 15, 2022. That date has arrived, and the legislature has not yet enacted a congressional redistricting plan. To avoid delaying the electoral process, the panel must now act.”
After the panel issued their order, Dave Orrick of the Twin Cities Pioneer Press wrote, “The impacts of the new maps weren’t immediately clear…Since Minnesota averted losing a congressional seat, the state’s eight districts for U.S. House members don’t appear jarringly different from current maps.”
