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IrelandFrum traces Republican losses to the risks of gerrymandering
The Atlantic host argues that maps designed to secure Republican majorities became a liability when voters swung away from the party.
The Atlantic
Story of Why this story? The video opened at a pace of 276,534 views a day, 14 times a normal first day on this channel (20,410).
How Republicans Lost Their Grip on Power | The David Frum Show
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- 0:00Frum argues that the midterms weakened a Republican electoral system, not just Trump's personal power.
- 0:58He traces that system to Republican victories in 2010 and the redistricting that followed.
- 3:22Spreading voters too thinly across districts can turn a gerrymander into a vulnerable "dummymander."
- 4:56Frum identifies future elections and post-census redistricting as opportunities for fairer maps.
- 6:14He argues that parties should win majorities through voter support and policy delivery, rather than favorable boundaries.
Butter spread across toast is David Frum's explanation for a political map that can suddenly stop working. Distribute your party's voters across enough districts and you can secure more seats. Spread them too thinly, though, and a shift against you can put many of those seats at risk together.
That is the trap Frum calls a "dummymander" in "How Republicans Lost Their Grip on Power | The David Frum Show." His argument is that the midterms did more than weaken Donald Trump: they broke parts of an electoral structure Republicans had built over years.
The episode drew about 200,000 views in its first 13 hours, already far beyond The Atlantic's usual first-day audience for regular videos.
Frum takes the explanation back to the Republican victories of 2010 and the redistricting that followed. Using North Carolina and Wisconsin as examples, he describes how drawing district boundaries helped turn electoral support into durable legislative majorities. The vulnerability, he argues, was that maps engineered to maximize seats could leave too little protection against a substantial change in the vote.
This is a different emphasis from his earlier episode, "Things Are Going to Get Ugly," which focused on how Trump might respond to defeat. Here, Frum looks beyond the president to courts, state-level mapmaking power and the next redistricting cycle after the census.
He sees an opening for fairer representation, not a guaranteed outcome. His closing political prescription is straightforward: parties should earn power by delivering policies voters want, rather than protecting themselves through district boundaries. As he puts it: "If you want majority power, you have to win a majority of the vote."
A state in the southeastern United States, on the Atlantic coast. Its capital is Raleigh, and its largest city is Charlotte.
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- Channel
- The Atlantic
- Subscribers
- 996,000 ▲ 5,000 this week
- Channel views, last 7 days
- 2,859,449
- Channel views, pace per day
- 210,482 (on a normal day: 316,610)
- Video published
- November 7, 2026
- Video views so far
- 201,379 (less than a day online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 276,534
The numbers
Frum's mapmaking analysis passed the channel's usual first-day views well before a full day had elapsed. Comments also exceeded the usual first-day total several times over.
💡 Test your knowledge
Which pair of states does Frum use to explain Republican gerrymandering?
Frum uses North Carolina and Wisconsin as examples of how state-level gerrymandering operated.