WASHINGTON, D.C. (WLNS) – Michigan is one of ten states expected to lose a seat in the U.S. House after the U.S. Census Bureau released figures from the 2020 Census today.
Unlike in the Senate, where every state gets two votes regardless of its size, seats in the House of Representatives are divided up based on a state’s population. If a state’s population gets smaller or doesn’t grow as fast as the rest of the country, it could lose seats to other, faster-growing states.
The population of the Midwest region actually declined from July 2019 to July 2020, according to an analysis by William Frey, a senior fellow at The Brooking Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program. Michigan, Illinois, Minnesota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia are all expected to lose one seat in the House of Representatives, along with California, New York, Rhode Island, and Alabama.
Conversely, states in the South and West saw small population gains. Texas is set to gain three seats while Florida is expected to gain two. Arizona, Colorado, Montana, North Carolina, and Oregon are all expected to gain one seat each.
Overall, the U.S. population grew by just 0.35% from July 2019 to July 2020, the slowest growth rate in at least 120 years. Even during the period from 1918 to 1919, when the Spanish Flu was at its height and U.S. troops were overseas fighting in World War I, the population still grew by 0.49%.