By Dave Dahl

SPRINGFIELD – Among the things supermajority Democrats have done during the redistricting process which irritate Republicans is to hire an expert witness to bolster their case.

A university professor from Washington, D.C., who has a book to sell, for what that’s worth. Anyway, anybody who has been around a courthouse for a while sees paid witnesses there, too, and – regardless of who doesn’t like it – it’s legal. The legislature has a budget for redistricting and is paying the witness from it.

And, as the redistricting process is currently taking up much of the statehouse oxygen, Prof. Kent Redfield says there are misconceptions.

Democrats mention a June 30 deadline, but “if they allow the process to go past the 30th of June, they lose control,” he says. “It goes to a redistricting commission.” That’s one reason it’s in the Republicans’ interest to wait until U.S. Census data are available, and that will be after June 30.

Speaking of that data, “Nowhere in the constitution does it say you have to use the final, official Census data,” says Redfield, a political science professor at University of Illinois Springfield.

Democrats, using American Community Survey data, say the variance is scant, but Republicans say 42,000 Illinois missed is not scant.

Dave Dahl can be reached at [email protected].