Astead Herndon

And as recently as 2000, the number hovered around 60, 65.

That has been cut almost in half by this midterm cycle, and it could get even lower as Republicans go further and further in terms of drawing red districts.

Gerrymandering isn't really about the maps.

It's about power.

Who gets it?

Whose voice matters in our democracy?

And who's written out of the process?

And in the midterms here especially, the maps itself could be more important in terms of determining the November result than the individual candidates themselves.

So all of this is important context when we think about the redistricting wars currently playing out in this election cycle.

Because while Donald Trump's push to get Republicans to do mid-year redistricting was unprecedented, it's only possible because the ways both parties have been comfortable with less competitive districts over time as it suited their partisan goals.

And the Supreme Court's recent decision to weaken the Voting Rights Act only makes this stuff more important and adds another wrinkle into an ever-developing story.

Amy Walter is here to break all of this down for me.

Amy is the publisher and editor-in-chief of the Cook Political Report and a PBS political analyst that tracks all this stuff.

Amy, thank you for joining us.

I appreciate your time.

I want us to dig into redistricting, gerrymandering, all the stuff that makes people's eyes usually glaze over.

But I want to start with what we already know.

Donald Trump kicked off his redistricting fight by asking Texas Republicans to redraw maps in favor of the GOP, and they complied.

Democrats responded by drawing their own set in California.

There was a referendum in Virginia to do a similar thing, which passed the public vote, but has since been overturned by the courts.