What is political gerrymandering?

See explanation.

Explanation:

Gerrymandering is the illegal act of redistricting a region in such a way that an opposing group will have their voice in Congress and the government restricted.

Every ten years, the U. S. has a census in which it is able to more accurately measure the population of the county and of each individual state. Based on the census, states are delegated a specific amount of members of the House of Representatives which must represent an equal distribution of the population in their state. For example, if State A has 2.5 million people and 5 Representatives, then each Representative must represent a district of approximately 500,000 people each.

In order to keep the districts equal, state politicians are charged with the duty of redrawing the districts in their state after each census. Gerrymandering is when they use this redraw (known as "redistricting") to give their party more power and limit another party.

For instance, say you have a state which is 60% Republican and 40% Democrat, and this state has 5 Congressional districts. It would make sense that this state has 3 Republican Representatives and 2 Democratic Representatives. However, if a Democratic politician were in charge of redistricting, they might try to fit all the Republicans into one district while maintaining even small majorities of Democrats in the other districts. This could result in the state having, for instance, 4 Democratic Representatives and only 1 Republican Representative despite its make-up.