“The View” co-host Joy Behar said something so stunningly incorrect this week about America’s election system that some now wonder whether she’s ever read the U.S. Constitution, let alone a book.
During a discussion Wednesday with ABC’s Matthew Dowd about the just-completed elections, she suggested the GOP captured additional seats in the U.S. Senate because of gerrymandering.
“Democrats won the popular vote last night by 8 million votes. But they lose U.S. Senate races in red areas,” Dowd initially said, spurring Behar to reply, “Because of gerrymandering …”
Listen below as Dowd explains to her why that is literally impossible:
“That’s not gerrymandering, that’s the Constitution. The districts are gerrymandered, but states are part of the Constitution,” he replied in a far more congenial tone than most would have used.
The makeup of the House is determined by congressional districts, and the process of redrawing these districts on the local level to better represent the population is known as gerrymandering. It’s viewed negatively by most because of attempts by local legislators to purposefully redraw districts to favor one particular political party over another.
While the framers of the U.S. Constitution purposefully based the House on districts to make it proportional to population, they likewise constructed the Senate to be proportional to the number of states in the union. Ergo, each state receives only two senators. This in turn prevent higher-population states from unfairly imposing their will on smaller states.
Clearly, Behar doesn’t understand any of this, presumably because she failed to pay attention in high school civics class, as speculated by many on social media:
@JoyVBehar gerrymandering lost the Senate for Democrats…Seriously? You do realize that each State elects two Senators for the entire State…hence redistricting would not change a damn thing…skipped Civics class much????
— Diane Williams (@islesny23) November 8, 2018
Joy Behar states on “The View” the Democrats lost senate seats in yesterday’s election because of gerrymandering…really?
I learned in civics class Senators are elected statewide. How can you gerrymander a statewide position? ??♂️— RE Champions (@REChampions) November 8, 2018
@JoyVBehar Hey, you really don’t need to keep providing your ignorance on politics. We know. Known it for years. Surprise us and take a Civics class. #gerrymanderingTheSenate
— Misanthropical Punch (@MisanthroPunch) November 8, 2018
You need to give @JoyVBehar a civics class. She actually tried to blame the GOP senate win on gerrymandering. It would be funny if it weren’t for all of her other misguided hyperbole.
— Lilly (@lillysmithstee1) November 8, 2018
@JoyVBehar may want to take a remedial civics class on how government works. Districts are for the members of the House not the Senate. #hivementality #thefeelstrumpfacts #leftistmob
— The Regressivist (@theregressivist) November 7, 2018
If you are going to talk politics on this show, you should go take a high school civics class. You have a platform and say stupid things like gerrymandering effected the Senate results. You uninformed viewers will eat this stupidity up.
— Russian bot operating out of Alabama. (@Kyzerpoza) November 7, 2018
Low IQ Behar thinks gerrymandering affects a statewide senate election! Hey joyless doesn”t matter what district your in you vote for one senator or the other. How is this thing on television everyday,READ A BOOK!
— octo8 (@DenierThomas) November 8, 2018
Genius ?? https://t.co/CjSHahRfFM
— Dan Bongino (@dbongino) November 8, 2018
But according to Bre Paxton at The Federalist, Dowd deserves some criticism as well for his odd decision to conflate the House’s popular vote with the Democrats’ Senate losses.
“When discussing Senate races, the number of total votes cast in favor of one party or another at the national level is completely irrelevant. To win a senate seat, one must win the popular vote in one’s own state,” she noted.
“Control of the U.S. Senate is not automatically handed to whatever party happens to get more ballots cast in its favor at the national level because senate races are determined at the state level, not nationally.”
Yet Dowd conflated them anyway, not that he was alone. An astounding number of left-wing “reporters” and “journalists” have been pushing the idea of an unfair ‘House popular vote‘ since before the election.
Hugely important point just now by @ezraklein: if the outcome of the midterms is that Republicans lose the popular vote for House and Senate, as they did w/ the White House, but due to gerrymandering emerge still controlling all three (and the Supreme Court)? Legitimacy crisis.
— Joy Reid (@JoyAnnReid) November 6, 2018
Democrats have a 12-point lead in the overall popular vote for the Senate and have lost three seats.
— Evan Hill (@evanchill) November 7, 2018
Democrats have a 12-point lead in the overall popular vote for the Senate and have lost three seats.
— Evan Hill (@evanchill) November 7, 2018
Republicans lost the popular vote in Senate races by over 15 percentage points, but still gained two seats. https://t.co/TFVdDGIiat
Our country is not a democracy.
— Amanda Marcotte (@AmandaMarcotte) November 7, 2018
Just to be clear, there’s no such thing as a “Senate popular vote” …
There is no such thing as a ‘Senate popular vote.’
That’s the point of the Senate, you moron.
*looks at bio*
YOURE A PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL SCIENCE?!? https://t.co/g4vArJYcjG— Benny (@bennyjohnson) November 7, 2018
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